SOCIALISM  AND  CHARACTER 


SOCIALISM    AND 
CHARACTER 


BY 


VIDA  D.   SCUDDER 


BOSTON  AND  NEW  YORK 
HOUGHTON  MIFFLIN  COMPANY 

re&$  Cambridge 
1912 


COPYRIGHT,   1912,    BY  VIDA  D.   SCUDDER 
ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 

Published  March  IQI2 


TO  FLORENCE  CONVERSE 

COMRADE  AND  COMPANION 

HEEE  on  this  holy  Tuscan  mountain  sanctified  by 
the  Passion  of  St.  Francis,  where  brown-robed  broth- 
ers move  about  in  an  exceeding  peace  among  their 
peasant-friends  and  white  sheep-flocks,  the  rumor  of 
the  modern  struggle  sounds  from  very  far  away.  Yet 
since  the  first  pages  of  this  book  were  written,  the  phe- 
nomenon it  signals,  as  you  and  I  are  aware,  has  be- 
come more  and  more  evident.  Socialism  is  now  making 
itself  felt  in  every  Anglo-Saxon  country,  not  merely 
as  an  academic  theory,  but  as  a  political  force.  Asso- 
ciations enlisting  the  joint  support  of  high  finance  and 
high  ideals  are  formed  against  it;  local  victories,  in 
the  United  States,  increase  with  each  election.  Shall 
this  socialism  remain  purely  political  ?  Or  shall  its 
rich  moral  possibilities  be  fostered  and  utilized  ?  Shall 
it  be  allowed  to  develop  mainly  as  a  negative  move- 
ment of  revolt  from  an  intolerable  situation,  or  should 
men  rather  stress  in  it  the  constructive  elements  related 
less  to  the  attainment  of  material  decencies  than  to 
the  upbuilding  of  character? 

These  are  the  questions  we  have  wanted  to  help 
people  to  think  out,  —  having  first  in  much  perplexity 
thought  them  out  for  ourselves.  We  have  known  what 
it  is  distrustfully  to  content  ourselves  with  "  near-so- 


241214 


TO  FLORENCE  CONVERSE 


cialism  " ;  to  take  refuge  in  timid  platitudes  concerning 
brotherhood  and  democracy ;  to  assuage  inward  unrest 
by  philanthropic  zeal  and  social  service.  For  us,  for 
many,  none  of  these  things  suffice.  In  full  allegiance 
to  political  socialism,  in  alliance  with  the  international 
socialist  party,  we  find  a  satisfaction  which  they  were 
powerless  to  afford,  and  it  is  a  satisfaction  which  we 
should  like  to  share.  The  unreserved  translation  of 
democratic  sympathies  into  economic  creed  and  polit- 
ical program  is  a  result  well  worth  the  cost ;  though 
that  cost,  involving  as  it  does  the  sacrifice  of  fastidious 
class-provincialism  in  ethics,  is,  frankly  speaking,  not 
small. 

To  separate  accidental  from  permanent  in  the  act- 
ual socialist  party  is  no  easy  task.  It  demands  vigor- 
ous mental  effort,  which  many  persons  of  refinement 
are  too  lazy  to  make,  —  finding  it  more  convenient 
and  more  consonant  with  prejudices  of  which  they  are 
unaware,  to  accept  the  blatantly  materialistic  tone  of 
some  current  socialism  at  face  value  as  representative 
of  the  whole  movement.  The  task  calls  also  for  no 
slight  degree  of  moral  courage. 

For  we  converts  to  political  socialism,  if  gently  nur- 
tured and  college  bred,  may  at  first  be  sadly  puzzled. 
Our  situation  resembles  that  of  a  social  worker  in  a 
country  like  the  United  States,  inhabited  by  different 
races.  Such  a  person,  passing  from  group  to  group, 
learns  that  there  is  little  possibility  of  common  national 
life  till  a  common  speech  be  established,  and  is  help- 
lessly conscious  that  severance  lies  deeper  than  speech, 

vi 


TO  FLORENCE  CONVERSE 


in  ineradicable  distinctions  of  racial  impulse.  Yet  he 
may  tell  himself  that  all  blood  circulates  perforce  to  the 
same  rhythm,  and  that  only  when  the  contributions  of 
the  races  shall  blend  in  one  can  his  country  attain  her 
destiny.  In  like  manner  conservative  Christian  and 
revolutionary  socialist  may  seem  not  only  to  speak  a 
different  language  but  to  think  in  different  categories,  | 
yet  you  and  I  are  convinced  that  in  the  reconciliation 
of  these  categories  lies  the  one  chance  for  escape  from 
an  ominous  future. 

Since  I  was  certain  that  such  reconciliation  is  the 
only  hope  for  democracy,  it  became  necessary  for  me  to 
write  this  book  which  expresses  our  common  thought. 
May  some  readers,  lifting  their  eyes  from  its  pages, 
gaze  as  from  this  lovely  Italian  height  over  a  sweep 
of  horizon  that  encircles  opposite  regions,  and  see  in- 
tersecting hill  ranges  as  parts  of  the  same  uplift  above 
the  plain  !  And  as  they  resolve  to  possess  the  rich  her- 
itage outspread  below,  may  they  remember  that  in  the 
secret  places  of  the  cliffs  which  create  their  vantage- 
ground  is  the  perpetual  memorial  of  Love  consum- 
mated through  sacrifice  and  pain ! 
LA  VERNA,  CASENTINO,  ITALY. 


CONTENTS 

PART  I:    THE   DILEMMA 

CHAPTER  I  :   THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 
**± 

.   I.  PLAN  AND  POINT  OF  VIEW 3 

II.  THE  SOCIAL  CRUSADE 8 

The  Summons 8 

The  Experiment  of  Philanthropy      .....  10 

III.  SOCIAL  EFFICIENCY 13 

"  Earning  Heaven  "  outgrown 13 

The  new  Aim,  Achievement 15 

IV.  CHECK-MATE! 16 

Reform  supplements  Philanthropy 16 

Defeat  of  Philanthropy  and  Reform 18 

—  The  Social  Tragedy .     .  21 

CHAPTER  II :  OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 

i— I.  MODERN  SOCIAL  IDEALISTS 23 

II.  THE  INDICTMENT  OF  CIVILIZATION 26 

Points  of  View 27 

The  Revolt  of  the  Ego 29 

Schools  of  Pity 36 

III,- SOLUTIONS 38 

i      i  Moralize  Civilization 38 

Abandon  Civilization 40 

Abandon  to  Moralize 42 

IV.  AN  IMPASSE 48 

Nietzsche  against  Tolstoy 48 

Discouragement 49 

CHAPTER  III:  A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 

I.  A  NEW  FORCE                                                       ,  51 


CONTENTS 


II.  SOCIALISM:  AN  HISTORIC  REVIEW 52 

The  Preparation 52 

The  "  Communist  Manifesto  " 55 

"*— -III.  REVIEW  CONTINUED:  1850-1900 57 

^-IV.   SOCIALISM  AND  THE  IDEALISTS 60 

Repudiation 60 

Points  of  Contact 61 

V.  THE  DIVIDING  POINT 63 

Socialist  Attitude  toward  Property 63 

«•    .  •*  Conservative  Radicalism 64 

The  Socialist  Challenge 67 

VI.  AN  EXULTANT  MOMENT 67 

CHAPTER  IV:  "THE  TUG'S  TO  COME" 

I.  HOSTILITY  BETWEEN  SOCIALISM  AND  RELIGION  .  71 

New  Fellowship 72 

New  Loneliness 72 

The  Paradox  of  Distrust 73 

II.  HISTORIC  PERSPECTIVES 74 

Socialism  and  the  Church 74 

A  Vicious  Circle 77 

III.  ZONES  OF  OPPOSITION  TO  SOCIALISM    ....  81 

Zone  of  Prejudice:  Class-Interests 81 

Zone  of  Appearances  :  Historic  Circumstance    .  83 

IV.  LAST  ZONE  OF  OPPOSITION 85 

Moral  Incertitudes 86 

Socialism  and  the  Soul 88 

V.  RELIGION  ON  GUARD! 89 

CHAPTER  V :  THE  APOLOGIA   OF  RELIGION 

I.  ON  THE  LEVEL  :  AVERAGE  ETHICS 93 

Wanted,  an  Apologia 93 

Spirit  or  Machine  ? 94 

Moral  Assets  of  the  Old  Order 95 

—  A  Defense  for  Conservatism    .                              .  £y 


CONTENTS 


II.  ON  THE  HEIGHTS  :  COUNSELS  OF  PERFECTION    .    98 

Franciscanisra 99 

Modern  Parallels 102 

The  Summons  of  Sanctity 104 

III.  ANTITHESES     .     .     , 104 

The  Freedom  of  Love  versus  Automatic  Justice  105 
The    Stage  of    Eternity  versus  the   Stage  of 
Time 106 

IV.  THE  WAITING  CHOICE 109 

-^*The  Greek  View  of  Life 109 

The  Socialist  View  of  Life 110 

The  Christian  View  of  Life 110 

V.  THE  WORK  BEFORE  Us    ,  .112 


PART  II:    FIRST  PRINCIPLES 

CHAPTER  I:  ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 

I.  "E  PUR  si  MUOVE" 115 

II.  A  CONTROVERSY 118 

Mazzini  and  Bakunin 118 

The  Base  of  Life  :  Economic  or  Spiritual  ?    .     .  121 

Persistent  Contradiction 122 

III.   THE  DETERMINIST  VICTORY 126 

Freedom's  Last  Stronghold 126 

Economic  Necessity 128 

The  Idealist  Fallacy 130 

The  Socialist  Contention 133 

THE  RISE  OF  THE  PROLETARIAT        136 

The  Workers  :  their  Role 137 

A  Moral  Opportunity 138 

V.  DEMOCRATIC  APPLICATIONS 141 

VI.  SYNTHESES 145 

Idealism  Triumphant 146 

Idealism  Obedient  .  147 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  II:  CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 

I.   CONSCIENCE  AND  THE  CLASS- STRUGGLE     .     .     .  149 

II.  MILITANT  NECESSITIES 153 

Parallels 154 

Provisional  Values 155 

III.  MORAL  ADVANTAGES  OF  THE  CLASS- STRUGGLE    156 

In  Trade-Unions 157 

In  Socialism 159 

Class-Feeling  as  a  Liberating  Power     ....  162 

IV.  LOYALTIES  IN  CONFLICT 163 

Under  Feudalism 164 

In  Contemporary  Life 165 

The  Socialist  Menace  .     .     < 166 

Adjustments 168 

V.  LOYALTY  TO  THE   WHOLE,   THE   END   OF   THE 

CLASS- WAR 169 

VI.  BEYOND  THE  CLASS-STRUGGLE 173 

The  Sanctity  of  Nature 173 

Place  for  Disinterestedness  f    .......  174 

A  Body  Prepared  for  Us 178 

VII.  THE  NEXT  STEP 179 

PART  III:  THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

CHAPTER  I:   "FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND " 

I.  THE  SPIRIT  IN  THE  WHEELS 183 

n.  VIRTUES  IN  FLUX •  .  188 

Moral  Shifting 190 

The  Modern  Emphasis 191 

III.   SOCIALIST  SELF-DISCIPLINES 193 

Lassalle's  Summary  of  Progress 193 

Future  Checks  on  License 194 

Why  needed 195 

How  possible 197 

The  Authority  of  the  Common  Will      ....  198 
xii 


CONTENTS 


IV.   SOME  PROBABLE  REACTIONS 200 

On  the  Malcontent 200 

On  the  Genius 203 

On  the  Average  Man 204 

V.   SOCIAL  LIBERTY  AT  LAST 204 

CHAPTER  II:   THE   ETHICS   OF  INEQUALITY 

I.   COMPARISON  INCUMBENT 207 

"SSf  II.   ON  THE  LEVEL  :  THE  ETHICS  OF  PRIVILEGE  .     .  208 

"  Scientific  "  Charity 210 

Other  Pit-falls 213 

III.  ON  THE  LEVEL  :  THE  ETHICS  OF  WANT    .    .    .  216 

Are  the  Poor  Blessed  ? 216 

Poverty  in  Chains 219 

IV.  ON  THE  HEIGHTS  :   COUNSELS  OF  PERFECTION   .  221 
— *  Franciscanism  Once  More 221 

A  Story  of  Defeat 224 

Defeat  Persistent  through  History 227 

t^  V.   FAILURE  OF  ETHICS  UNDER    SOCIAL   INEQUAL- 
ITY   231 

Demonstrated  practically 232 

Demonstrated  spiritually 233 

A  Dangerous  Paradox 233 

The  Case  for  Self-Protection 234 

Christianity  versus  Civilization 235 

Reductio  ad  Absurdum 238 

CHAPTER  III:  THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

I.  HOLINESS  AND  EFFICIENCY 239 

Forever  at  Odds 239 

«•_  Reconciled  under  Social  Equality 240 

II.   THE  SOCIALIZED  STATE 0    .    .     .  241 

Services  and  Rewards 242 

No  Thought  for  the  Morrow  ! 243 

Normal  Incentives 244 

III.  ON  THE  LEVEL:  THE  VIRTUES  TRANSFIGURED  .  246 


CONTENTS 


IV.  EQUALITY  OF  OPPORTUNITY  IN  ETHICS  ....  251 

\  Chivalry  for  All 252 

I  Poverty  for  All 254 

/  Sympathy  as  a  Fine  Art 255 

V.   SHADOWS 258 

VI.  ON  THE  HEIGHTS  :  THE  COUNSELS  AGAIN     .    .  262 

The  "  Economic  Base  "  of  Sanctity 263 

Love  Gains  the  Right  of  Way 264 

VII.  THE  RETURN  TO  NATURE 266 

Field-Flowers  and  Economics 267 

Natural  and  Social  Law 270 

Economic  Harmonies ^ .  272 

Social  Equality  the  One  Hope  for  the  Ideal  of 
Jesus 272 

CHAPTER  IV:  THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

I.  A  "  REAL  ASSENT  "  TO  SOCIALISM 273 

II.  WITNESSES  TO  LIFE 276 

Contrary  Attacks 276 

Conflicting  Sects 277 

Opposite  Interpretations      .     .     „ 281 

III.  PERSONAL  RESPONSIBILITY 282 

CHAPTER  V:  RECOVERIES 

I.  THE  VALUE  OF  TRADITION 284 

II.  SOCIALISM  THE  GUARDIAN  OF  PROPERTY  .    .    .  288 

The  Property-Instinct  Sacred 289 

The  Property-Instinct  Trained  by  Industrialism  291 

The  Property-Instinct  Travestied 292 

The  Socialist  Corrective 293 

Group-Ownership  :  its  Joy  and  Power  ....  294 

III.  SOCIALISM  THE  FULFILLMENT  OF  IDEALISM    .     .  298 

IV.  SOCIALISM   THE   GOAL  OF  PHILANTHROPY  AND 

REFORM 302 

Their  Trend  Toward  Socialism 303 

Their  Training  for  Socialism 305 

ziv 


CONTENTS 


V.   SOCIALISM  AND  LEADERSHIP 307 

Leaders  :  Where  to  be  Found  ? 308 

Among  Socialists  ? 309 

Among  Financiers  ? 310 

Among  Social  Reformers  ? 311 

— • r  Socialism  a  Conservative  Force 312 

PART  IV:  THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

CHAPTER  I:  SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 

I.  RELIGION  INDISPENSABLE 315 

II.  THE  RELIGIOUS  SITUATION 318 

Religion  in  Bondage 318 

Socialism  to  the  Rescue 321 

III.  PRESENT-DAY  FACTORS 323 

Western  Science :  Social  Reconstruction    .     .     .  323 

Contacts  of  East  and  West 324 

The  Gift  of  the  Orient 326 

IV.  THE  RELIGIOUS  FUTURE 327 

Dogma  versus  Sentiment 328 

Conformity  versus  Progress 329 

The  "  Economic  Base  "  in  Religion 330 

The  Divine  Origin 331 

V.  SOCIAL    DEMOCRACY    AND    THE    CONCEPT    OF 

GOD 331 

Personal  or  Impersonal  ? 332 

Ideas  of  Immanence 332 

Ideas  of  Transcendence 333 

VI.  SOCIAL  DEMOCRACY  AND  THE  CONCEPT  OF  IM- 
MORTALITY     337 

CHAPTER  II:  SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

I.  CHRISTIANITY  :  Is  IT  PERMANENT  ? 341 

II.  CHRISTIANITY:  ITS  FUTURE  RIVALS 345 

On  Lines  of  Hedonism 346 

On  Lines  of  Asceticism 347 

xv 


CONTENTS 


III.  CHRISTIANITY  :  ITS  ESSENCE 343 

IV.  DOCTRINES  OF  THE  TRINITY  AND  THE  INCARNA- 

TION UNDER  SOCIALISM 350 

The  "Social  Thought  of  God" 351 

Love  the  Alpha 352 

The  Incarnation  the  Sanction  of  Social  Hope      .  353 

V.  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  ATONEMENT  UNDER  SOCIALISM  356 

Superficially  Repugnant  to  Socialism     ....  356 

Profoundly  Essential  to  It 357 

Vicarious  Atonement  the  Sacrament  of  Brother- 
hood  361 

Social  Remorse  and  Redemption 362 

Love  the  Omega 364 

VI.  ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM  AND  AN  HISTORIC  REVE- 
LATION  366 

VII.  CHURCH  FORMS  OF  THE  FUTURE 367 

CHAPTER  III:    THE    KINGDOM    OF    GOD   AND 
THE  SOCIALIST  STATE 

I.  THE  SOCIAL  PURPOSE  OF  JESUS 372 

II.   THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD  :  ITS  NATURE    ....  376 

Personal,  Ecclesiastical,  Social  ? 37<5 

Present  or  Future  ? 377 

III.  THE  EARLY  TEACHING  :  EVOLUTION 380 

Some  Aspects  of  Citizenship 381 

Brotherhood  and  Detachment :  how  Reconcile  ?  383 

The  Mediaeval  Misunderstanding 385 

Socialism  and  the  Kingdom 386 

IV.  THE  LATER  TEACHING  :  REVOLUTION     ....  386 

The  Change  in  Tone 387 

Logic  of  the  Sequence 388 

Catastrophe  Essential  to  Progress 390 

Millennial  Hope  for  Earth 391 

V.  POINTS  OF  CONTACT  WITH  SOCIALISM    ....  392 
VI.  THE  FATE  IN  HISTORY  OF  JESUS'  IDEAL   .    .    .  395 
Disintegration  :  the  Church  and  the  Parousia    .  396 
xvi 


CONTENTS 


Past  Achievements  of  Christianity 398 

Future  Task  :  Recovery  of  the  Kingdom-Idea    .  399 
The  Philosophical  Anarchist 400 

CONCLUSION  :   "A  WISE  BEHAVIOR" 

I.   CONVERSATION  IN  HEAVEN 403 

II.  OLD  MORALS,  NEW  INCENTIVES 406 

III.  ORGANIC  FILAMENTS 410 

IV.  SOCIALISM  AND  THE  SIMPLE  LIFE 416 

Irrelevant  Connection 417 

The  Rich  Christian  an  Anomaly 418 

The  Rich  Socialist  a  Possible  Mistake  ....  419 

Incentives  to  Simplicity 420 

Ascetic  :  ^Esthetic  :   Social. 

Contemporary  Incentive  Social 421 

Future  Incentive  ^Esthetic 422 

Practical  Considerations 424 

V.  THE  RELIGION  OF  A  SOCIALIST 425 

Expiation 425 

Aspiration 427 

U.-T-  VT    THE  LAST  WORD  :  FELLOWSHIP  AND  HOPE   .    .  429 


***  For  permission  to  reprint  portions  of  this  book,  thanks 
are  due  to  The  Hibbert  Journal,  The  Atlantic  Monthly  y 
and  The  Harvard  Theological  Review. 


PART  I 
THE  DILEMMA 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHARACTER 

PAKT  I.   THE  DILEMMA 
CHAPTER  I 

THE    MODERN    ADVENTURE 


WHAT  is  the  excuse  for  adding  a  voice  to  the  con- 
fused chorus  that  accompanies  the  swift  social  changes 
in  process  everywhere?  Why  present  another  book 
on  socialism  ? 

The  nai'f  apology  is  the  truest :  one  writes  to  relieve 
one's  mind.  And  probably  the  best  chance  of  contrib- 
uting something  valuable  to  the  eager  conversation  is 
frankly  to  strike  the  personal  note.  For  these  same 
changes  are  not  merely  external.  In  last  analysis,  they 
proceed  from  within :  in  final  reaction,  they  transform 
character.  The  creation  of  old  age  pensions,  the  evalu- 
ation of  English  land,  the  capture  of  an  American 
city  government  by  socialists,  are  not  only  objective 
facts :  they  connote  interesting  things  happening  to 
our  souls,  which  we  may  well  like  to  confide  to  one 
another.  For  what  happens  to  the  individual  soul  is 
the  only  matter  of  real  consequence  in  the  world. 

Many  middle-aged  persons  to-day  havepassed  through 
3 


THE  DILEMMA 


a  succession  of  great  and  searching  emotions,  unre- 
lated to  what  we  usually  consider  personal  affairs. 
Such  emotions  ennoble  or  belittle  according  to  the  wel- 
come they  receive.  They  are  part  of  that  larger  con- 
sciousness which  is  sweeping  the  concerns  of  the  whole 
race  into  its  private  orbit:  the  gift  of  democracy, 
quickening  marvelous  new  instincts  in  the  dull  old 
world.  They  are  sure  to  come  faster  in  the  quarter- 
century  before  us.  Whether  we  will  or  no,  a  shudder- 
ing plunge  into  new  social  experiences  awaits  our  gen- 
eration. The  magnitude  of  the  changes  may  well  daze 
us  for  a  time ;  quite  possibly,  we  shall  be  more  aware 
of  the  sweep  of  the  planet  on  its  way  through  space, 
than  of  that  serene  succession  of  sowings  and  reapings 
in  the  promotion  of  which  it  behooves  us  to  bear  our 
part.  In  the  mere  prospect  of  probable  severance  from 
many  accustomed  institutions,  with  their  warm  com- 
forts of  use  and  want,  does  not  a  salutary  but  confusing 
excitement  already  begin  to  stir  among  thoughtful 
people  ?  And  if  so,  may  we  not  grow  stronger  in  spirit 
by  considering  together  those  more  intimate  reactions 
on  personality  by  which  the  whole  process  must  be 
judged  ? 

Moral  preparation  for  a  New  Order !  It  might  well 
be  the  watchword  of  the  hour :  it  is  the  last  thing  of 
which  one  ever  hears.  The  Socialist  Party  in  Germany 
gains  a  million  votes  in  five  years.  A  great  scheme 
suggesting  state  socialism  is  launched  in  England.  If 
the  movement  in  the  United  States  is  less  concentrated 
than  in  older  or  more  autocratic  countries,  socialist 

4 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

sentiment  is  perhaps  still  more  widely  diffused.  "  Shoot- 
ing Niagara,  —  and  After,"  was  the  title  of  one  of 
Carlyle's  alarmist  pamphlets  over  half  a  century  ago. 
The  stream  is  broad,  and  we  have  not  shot  Niagara  yet, 
but  may  not  the  increasing  roar  we  hear  be  the  sound 
ef  dangerous  rapids,  to  which  we  are  drawing  near, 
even  though  no  cataract  threaten  us  with  destruction  ? 

It  is  of  course  still  possible  to  stop  one's  ears :  it 
is  also  feasible  to  try  to  work  upstream,  and  many 
thinkers  and  some  statesmen  are  to-day  engaged  in  this 
pursuit.  Meantime,  everybody  is  talking.  A  great  dis- 
cussion is  "  on,"  which  throws  all  other  interests  tem- 
porarily into  the  shade.  While  it  rages,  the  socialist 
vote  continues  to  increase,  and  the  idea  should  occur 
to  an  impartial  observer  that  the  sober-minded  public 
might  well  be  getting  ready  for  the  possible  plunge. 
But  the  militant  socialists  are  too  busy  with  propa- 
ganda to  think  about  this,  and  the  conservatives  are 
absorbed  in  rebuttal. 

This  book  proposes  to  discuss  in  some  detail  the 
probable  moral  and  spiritual  results  of  the  social 
change  that^seems  to  be  impending.  The  task  is  un- 
dertaken in  the  double  hope  of  so  clarifying  the  issues 
that  some  people  now  hesitant  may  be  helped  to  de- 
cide where  to  take  their  stand,  and  of  suggesting 
some  points  in  the  practical  training  of  mind  and  con- 
science which  the  transformation  in  ethics  accompany- 
ing any  serious  economic  change  should  immediately 
demand.  The  point  of  view  of  the  book  is  that  of  a 
socialist,  —  a  class-conscious,  revolutionary  socialist, 

5 


DILEMMA 


if  you  will,  —  to  whom  none  the  less  the  spiritual 
harvest,  the  fruits  of  character,  are  the  only  result 
worth  noting  in  any  economic  order.  To  demonstrate 
the  approach  of  socialism,  or  to  discuss  socialist  theory 
on  customary  lines,  is  apart  from  the  scope  of  this 
study.  Many  important  matters  germane  to  our 
theme  —  such  as  the  endlessly  stimulating  topic  of 
incentive  in  the  socialist  community  —  will  be  treated 
only  obliquely,  because  so  much  has  been  said  about 
them  already.  No  assertion  will  be  made  concern- 
ing the  exact  ultimate  forms  society  will  assume,  nor 
the  desirable  balance  of  competitive  and  cooperative 
forces  in  the  socialized  commonwealth ;  but  it  will  be 
taken  for  granted  that  this  balance  is  changing,  and 
that  civilization  is  engaged  in  evolution  from  earlier 
and  purely  individualistic  forms,  toward  a  socialized 
order.  The  word  socialism,  moreover,  glows  to  the 
writer,  not  with  the  delicate  rose-pink  so  pleasantly 
popular,  but  with  a  deep  uncompromising  red.  Be  it 
remembered  nevertheless  that  the  hue  of  blood  and 
flame  is  the  hue  for  the  Feast  Days  of  "the  Lord, 
and  Giver  of  Life,"  the  Spirit  of  Pentecost. 

Sound  evolutionary  thought  finds  retrospect  its 
first  duty.  To  retrospect,  then,  let  us  bend  ourselves  ; 
to  the  review  of  a  personal  experience  —  it  may  be 
yours,  it  happens  to  be  mine  —  during  the  quarter- 
century  behind  us.  The  background  must  be  sketched 
too,  that  private  consciousness  may  be  related  to  the 
general  psychical  life  born  of  the  changing  order : 

6 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

therefore  a  study  will  be  made  of  those  contending 
schools  in  social  idealism  which  sought  our  suffrages 
during  the  nineteenth  century  and  seek  them  still : 
this  study  to  be  based  less  on  the  impersonal  specula- 
tions of  economists  than  on  the  more  tentative  and 
human  experience  reflected  in  letters.  Having  gained 
power  intelligently  to  face  the  past,  some  broad  per- 
ception may  emerge  of  relations  and  tendencies : 
issues  will  grow  clearer ;  certain  possibilities  will  be 
rejected ;  and  in  due  time  two  main  alternatives  in 
social  theory  and  attitude  will  present  themselves  for 
discussion. 

When  these  alternatives  are  thoroughly  understood, 
choice  between  them  will  be  incumbent.  But  it  must 
be  long  deferred;  for  first,  inquiry  must  penetrate 
to  fundamentals.  Ajways_.kepping  i'u-mifl4-ffi*esk~for 
the  social  order_mostjayorable_tQ  character .>  the  basic 
assumptions  of  the  opposing  schools  must  be  consid- 
ered. This  process  will  lead  on,  to  such  forecast  as 
prescience  can  venture  of  the  probable  socialist  reac- 
tions on  morals  and  religion,  and  to  comparison  of 
the  finer  assets  of  the  society  familiar  to  us  with  those 
to  be  expected  in  the  future.  In  the  course  of  these 
comparisons,  choice  will  define  itself;  at  their  close, 
a  backward  glance  will  compare  the  social  ideals  of 
the  Founder  of  Christianity  with  the  modern  socialist 
schools.  For  those  already  inclined  to  accept  socialist 
theory  in  the  abstract,  the  note  of  preparation  will 
have  been  stressed  throughout  the  discussion :  and 
before  the  book  ends,  a  conclusion  of  practical  applica- 

7 


THE  DILEMMA 


tions  will  try  plainly  to  define  personal  duty  during 
these  days  of  transition  in  which  our  lot  is  cast. 

The  book  will  fulfill  its  aim  if  it  make  the  lines 
of  that  duty  clearer,  and  if  it  also  bring  light  here 
and  there  to  an  honest  seeker  for  the  type  of  civiliza- 
tion which  shall  best  foster  moral  and  spiritual  valuesr 
as  he  stands  between  the  clamorous  schools  of  a 
socialism  too  often  materialistic  and  a  Christianity 
toooften  short-sighted. 


II 

What  did  the  spirit  experience,  when,  a  quarter  of 
a  century  or  more  ago,  it  first  became  aware  that  life 
to  be  found  must  be  lost  in  the  whole  of  humanity's 
well-being  ? 

Dreams  first  :  high  dreams  and  fair,  such  as  young 
men  must  dream  in  any  age  if  old  men  are  to  see  vis- 
ions. Dreams  of  fellowship  and  sacrifice,  of  a  demo- 
cracy coming  to  its  own,  of  a  Holy  City  of  Brotherhood 
descending  from  the  heavens.  Born  largely  from  the 
words  of  the  great  nineteenth-century  idealists  from 
Shelley  to  Tolstoy,  these  dreams  stirred  in  us  the  sense 
of  a  society  in  bonds  and  of  a  great  liberation  entrusted 
to  our  age  to  accomplish.  The  very  thought  of  that 
bondage  was  part  of  the  dream,  as,  moved  alternately 
by  imaginative  distress  over  the  evils  suggested  and  by 
literary  pleasure  in  the  stinging  eloquence,  we  pondered 
in  seclusion  the  splendid  invectives  against  modern 
civilization  penned  by  the  great  masters.  The  captivity 
of  the  workers,  the  apathy  of  the  privileged,  the  maui- 

8 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

fold  miseries  and  deformities  of  modern  life,  were  seen 
as  through  a  haze. 

But  the  realities  that  inspired  the  invectives  were 
never  far  away  in  Victorian  England  or  modern 
America ;  and  the  sharp  shock  of  waking  contact  with 
them  was  sure  to  come.  It  might  be  given  by  the  sight 
of  the  stream  of  faces  pouring  sullen  and  sodden  from 
some  factory  door  of  an  evening,  or  by  revulsion  from 
the  hideous  squalor  of  the  approach  to  some  great  city 
watched  through  train  windows ;  or  it  might  well  reach 
us  through  relation  to  some  individual  in  distress,  some 
human  derelict,  impossible  to  place  in  the  whirring 
machine  of  production,  a  gruesome,  pitiful  product  of 
social  conditions  so  inexorable  that  no  sentimental 
platitude  nor  casual  benevolence  had  any  bearing  on 
the  case.  So,  in  one  way  or  another,  dreams  led  out  to 
the  waking  spectacle  of  civilisation  as  it  is  ;  incredibly 
wasteful,  impossibly  cruel,  —  so  complex  and  seemingly 
inevitable  a  thing  that  the  mind  was  forced  to  accept 
as  a  necessity  what  revolted  the  heart  as  a  monstrosity. 
The  Social  Problem  was  before  us,  and  life  had  begun. 

And  out  of  the  region  where  dreams  and  realities 
blend,  came  clear  and  strong  the  Call  of  the  Open 
Road :  the  summons  to  action,  confusedly  but  with 
ever-increasing  emphasis  voiced  by  our  most  honored 
masters  from  the  time  of  Carlyle.  This  might  sound 
from  the  lips  of  Ruskin,  of  Mazzini,  of  some  young 
preacher  unknown  to  history,  or  of  a  mere  grave-eyed 
acquaintance.  It  bade  us  leave  the  perplexities  of 
speculation  and  reflection,  and  bend  us  to  the  deed: 

9 


THE  DILEMMA 


what  deed,  but  the  sacred  Service  of  the  People  ?  By 
dozens  and  by  hundreds,  young  men  and  women  heard 
and  obeyed  the  call.  Those  were  the  days  of  the  eighties 
and  the  nineties  which  witnessed  in  Europe  and  the 
United  States  a  gradual  introduction  of  new  life  into 
the  dry  science  of  political  economy,  a  quickening  of 
the  civic  conscience,  and  an  active  development  of  social 
service  in  manifold  forms.  That  gentle,  fiery  spirit, 
Prince  Kropotkin,  noted  in  those  days  among  the  flower 
of  young  English  men  and  women  a  movement  akin 
to  that  Return  to  the  People  which  had  lately  stirred 
Young  Russia  to  the  depths  and  been  so  delicately 
depicted  by  Tourgenieff  in  "  Virgin  Soil "  ;  albeit 
Kropotkin  observed  the  decorous  English  movement 
to  call  for  less  fervor  of  martyrdom.  Did  it  indeed  call 
for  martyrdom  at  all,  this  modern  impulse  toward  social 
service  ?  Certainly,  the  happiness  of  release  was  more 
than  any  pain  of  renunciation,  when  first  we  learned 
to  escape  the  barriers  of  class,  breathe  the  free  air  of 
human  fellowship,  and  regard  those  terrors  of  disease 
and  poverty  which  we  confronted,  no  longer  as  a  mere 
horrid  Darkness  blackening  the  sky  and  baffling  the 
fighter,  but  as  a  substantial  stronghold  of  wrongs  that 
could  be  attacked,  and  perhaps  overcome. 

So  the  great  appeal  to  the  conscience  of  the  privi- 
leged classes  which  had  during  all  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury kept  pace  with  the  rise  of  capitalism  and  indus- 
trialism bore  fruit  in  action ;  and  it  came  to  pass, 
curiously  enough,  that  by  the  end  of  the  century 
the  word  "  social "  had  changed  its  connotation,  and 

10 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

III 

If  personal  peace  were  the  end  of  conduct,  our 
story  might  end  here.  But  it  is  only  begun.  For  such 
peace  can  satisfy  no  one  born  anew  in  the  spirit  of 
democracy.  Only  a  fulfillment  of  the  angelic  prophecy, 
"  Peace  on  Earth,"  can  meet  our  need. 

Here  we  touch  one  of  the  widest  differences  separat- 
ing the  idealism  of  the  modern  western  world  from 
that  of  the  Orient  or  of  medieval  Catholicism.  The 
way  of  sacrifice  has  always  been  known  to  the  initiate 
as  the  only  way  of  life.  But  that  sacrifice  has  been 
subtly  interwoven  with  egotism,  to  be  recognized  no 
less  in  the  Buddhist,  winning  by  deeds  of  charity  the 
"  merit  "  to  speed  him  on  his  journey  to  Nirvana,  than 
in  the  Catholic  ascetic,  "  earning  Heaven,"  though  it 
were  the  pure  heaven  of  union  with  his  crucified  Lord, 
through  self  -  mortification  and  mercy.  Who  would 
deny  that  fine  impulses  of  love  and  pity  blended  in 
both  cases  with  the  individualist  motive  of  exalted 
self-realization  ?  To  console  the  afflicted,  to  rescue  the 
perishing,  to  minister  to  the  sick,  has  ever  brought 
holy  delight  and  satisfied  deep  needs  of  affection.  Yet 
these  tender  ministries  have  been  habitually  exerted 
as  ends  in  themselves,  destined  to  find  ultimate  value 
less  in  the  bodily  good  of  him  who  received  them  than 
in  the  spiritual  salvation  of  him  who  gave. 

Certainly  they  were  included  in  no  larger  scheme 
of  general  social  rehabilitation.  Nor  could  they  be  so  ; 
for  a  personal  and  self-centred  point  of  view  was  im- 

13 


THE  DILEMMA 


posed  by  the  limitations  of  the  contemporary  outlook. 
The  larger  tides  of  human  destiny  formerly  either 
ebbed  and  flowed  unnoted,  or  were  considered  to  be 
•'independent  of  human  control.  In  such  days,  the  an- 
gijiished  compassion  which  has  always  filled  noble  hearts 
at  the  spectacle  of  mortal  misery  could  be  assuaged 
only  by  devotion  to  the  individual  leper,  the  special 
case  of  need.  That  suffering  as  a  whole  was  an  evil 
to  be  attacked,  that  our  aim  should  be  less  to  serve 
than  to  abolish  it,  would  have  been  an  attitude  incon- 
ceivable to  the  medieval  mind. 

Times  have  changed.  A  sense  of  power,  troubling,  im- 
perious, has  descended  upon  us.  We  do  not  yet  know 
very  well  what  to  do  with  it,  but  we  cannot  escape  it. 
Belief  in  the  divine  possibilities  of  men  quickens  our 
expectant  wills :  — 

"  Thou  art  a  man  :  God  is  no  more  : 
Thine  own  humanity  learn  to  adore," 

cried  William  Blake  at  the  beginning  of  the  modern 
democratic  epoch.  Conscious  of  mystical  union  with 
the  proletarian  and  the  outcast,  assured  that  they  and 
we  united  can  shape  the  world  as  we  will,  we  rise  to 
the  splendid  summons.  Reinforcement  comes  from 
our  recently  acquired  knowledge  that  the  only  sure 
fact  is  ceaseless  flux,  in  the  social  as  in  the  natural 
order. 

The  simple,  depressing  instincts  of  pre-democratic, 
pre-evolutionary  days  still  largely  dominate  our  social 
creeds  and  deeds.  We  talk  much  of  brotherhood :  but 

14 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

from  suggesting  the  gayeties  of  the  drawing-room! 
came  currently  to  imply  the  ardors  of  a  new  crusade. 
The  "  Social  Movement  " !  How  swiftly  it  developed, 
adopted  by  countless  organizations,  religious  and  sec- 
ular, offering  scope  for  every  type  of  capacity,  and 
accepting  all  degrees  of  service,  from  a  languid  sub- 
scription to  a  consecrated  life  ! 

And  here  we  well  may  pause  for  an  instant :  for 
here  is  the  last  point  which  we  are  likely  to  reach  in 
this  book,  of  positive  unchallenged  gain  to  the  uneasy 
social  conscience.  Very  great  is  that  gain,  surely.  It 
means  that  an  epoch  and  an  anguish  lie  behind  us. 
No  one  to-day,  longing  to  join  the  task  of  social  ameli- 
oration, lacks  opportunities  for  work.  In  some  com- 
pany of  the  valiant  hosts  attacking  the  forts  of  folly, 
in  some  phase  of  the  fourfold  service  enjoined  by 
Ruskin,  —  dressing  people,  feeding  people,  housing 
people,  or  rightly  pleasing  people,  —  every  tempera- 
ment and  capacity  can  find  effective  place.  Through 
the  fifties  and  sixties  of  the  last  century,  men  eager  for 
social  service  echoed  half-paralyzed  the  baffled  cry  of 
Clough,  written  in  the  memorable  year  1848  : l  — 

If  there  is  battle,  't  is  battle  by  night,  I  stand  in  the  dark- 
ness. 


O  that  the  armies  indeed  were  arrayed  !  O  joy  of  the  onset  ! 
Sound,  thou  Trumpet  of  God,  come  forth,  Great  Cause,  to  array 
us, 

1  The  Bothie  of  Tober-na-Vuolich. 
11 


THE  DILEMMA 


King  and  leader  appear,  thy  soldiers  sorrowing  seek  thee. 
Would  that  the  armies  indeed  were  arrayed  !   Oh  where  is  the 

battle  ! 
Neither  battle  I  see,  nor  arraying,  nor  king  in  Israel, 

Only  infinite  jumble  and  mess  and  dislocation, 
Backed  by  a  solemn  appeal,  For  God's  sake,  do  not  stir,  there. 

We  may  be  grateful  that  those  days  are  over,  and  that 
the  plain  path  to  practical  service  has  been  opened  by 
the  modern  movement  of  philanthropy  to  whosoever 
wills  to  tread  it. 

It  is  the  old  path,  of  course,  trodden  in  every  age,  not 
only  by  the  saints,  but  by  throngs  of  their  nameless  fol- 
lowers. And  now  as  always  he  who  follows  it  enters  into 
that  inheritance  which  only  the  meek  can  know.  So  far 
as  the  attainment  of  peace  at  the  centre  and  joy  that  is 
not  fugitive  is  concerned,  no  other  path  through  experi- 
ence has  ever  been  blazed.  Throngs  are  seeking  this  path 
to-day :  a  few  embracing  Lady  Poverty  in  the  city  slums 
with  an  ardor  equal  to  that  of  the  first  Franciscans,  and 
devoting  themselves  to  the  service  of  "Our  Lords 
the  Poor,"  with  a  tenderness  no  less  keen  than  that 
of  the  Catherines  of  Siena  and  Genoa,  because  more 
guarded  in  method  and  more  efficient  in  result.  Even 
the  world  hails  them  as  fortunate  ;  for  while  it  pur- 
sues its  own  way,  it  has  always  in  a  dim  theoretical 
fashion  recognized  selfless  devotion  to  be  the  highest 
good,  and  paid  fullest  honors  to  the  servants  of  hu- 
manity, at  least  after  they  have  died. 


12 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

our  democratic  faith  seldom  penetrates  below  the 
surface  of  our  theories  or  actions.  Evolutionary  lan- 
guage is  always  on  our  lips :  but  we  direct  our  social 
activities  as  if  change  on  broad  lines  were  inconceivable, 
and  we  condemned  helplessly  to  minister  to  the  end 
of  time,  within  the  limits  of  a  static  stratified  society, 
to  the  same  old  needs  forever  generated  by  the  same 
old  situation.  Yet  we  are  growing  restive.  Through 
these  fatalistic  instincts  the  wind  of  a  larger  hope 
has  begun  to  blow.  As  it  revives  us,  the  old  concep- 
tion of  "earning  Heaven"  ceases  to  interest,  while 
at  the  same  time  we  cannot  stay  content  with  help- 
ing the  individual  here  and  there.  Modern  times  have 
not  abolished  the  old  ideal  of  sanctity,  but  they  have 
made  a  distinct  addition  to  it.  They  put  stress  on  a 
new  "  note  " :  efficiency,  with  which  we  may  be  sure 
none  of  the  older  saints  ever  bothered  themselves.  We 
"  children  of  process "  have  been  rising,  during  the 
last  twenty-five  years,  to  the  conviction  that  (it  is  our 
task,  not  only  to  relieve  the  wretched  but  to  fight  the 
causes  of  wretchedness.  Even  while  the  modern  Good 
Samaritan  binds  the  wounds  of  the  wayfarer,  he  med- 
itates how  to  free  the  road  from  robbers.  He  can  no 
longer  be  content  to  soothe  his  own  soul  by  lavishing 
personal  devotion  while  a  mountain  of  social  injustice 
awaits  the  potent  faith  that  shall  speak  the  liberating 
word. 


15 


THE  DILEMMA 


IV 

And  thus  the  question  rose,  as  to  the  value  and 
efficiency  of  those  ministries  so  ardently  pursued. 
Did  they  meet  the  situation  ?  Putting  mind  as  well 
as  heart  on  the  matter,  could  we  honestly  feel  that 
the  indefinite  multiplication  of  such  agencies  as  oc- 
cupied us,  whether  these  happened  to  be  organized 
charities,  peoples'  institutes,  soup-kitchens  or  missions, 
would  ever  bring  effectual  satisfaction  to  the  needs 
we  sought  to  relieve?  To  put  the  question  marked 
a  new  stage  of  progress.  Then  as  now  it  received  an- 
swers which  divided  men  into  opposing  schools.  But 
those  were  many,  and  they  increased  daily,  who  in 
the  light  of  it  found  their  most  ardent  social  efforts 
chilled  by  doubt. 

These  efforts,  as  the  years  went  on,  tended  to 
change  in  character.  For  the  social  movement  deepened 
as  it  advanced.  From  works  of  mercy  and  relief 
on  conventional  lines,  it  developed  phases  ever  more 
democratic  and  more  iinbued.with  a  demand  for  justice. 
At  the  outset  it  was  prone  to  regard  the  unfortu- 
nate as  weaklings,  to  be  saved  from  the  logical  results 
of  their  moral  and  practical  feebleness  by  a  pity  peril- 
ously near  to  impatience  and  not  untouched  with 
contempt.  But  as  time  passed,  men  were  forced  to 
the  startling  perception  that  the  poverty  which  was 
the  destruction  of  the  poor  was  created  less  by  them- 
selves than  by  the  society  in  which  they  played  their 
helpless  part. 

16 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

•  This  was  a  great  discovery.  It  meant  the  gradual 
abandonment  of  philanthropy  for  reform,  —  an  aban- 
donment still  half-conscious,  but  unmistakably  to  be 
traced  as  we  look  back.  Reform,  giving  up  hope  that 
the  individual  could  ever  be  set  on  his  feet  within 
an  unchanged  situation,  faced  in  a  new  direction,  and 
demanded,  that  in  large  or  in  little  this  situation  be 
changed. 

Did  the  new  start  mean  effectual  advance  toward 
a  land  of  justice?  Whether  or  no,  the  application 
of  moral  force  to  social  conditions  went  on  merrily 
and  earnestly.  The  words  of  the  great  teachers  were 
not  unheeded.  Compunction  became  more  and  more 
poignant,  driving  increasing  numbers  to  social  service 
through  sheer  discomfort.  Even  that  much-scouted 
agency,  the  Church,  played  a  modest  but  growing  part 
in  quickening  such  compunction  and  diverting  energy 
into  selfless  channels.  So  before  the  end  of  the  cen- 
tury here  were  scientific  charity,  standing  for  more 
or  less  intelligent  care  of  our  victims,  and  sundry 
attempts  at  deeper  fellowship,  ending  in  that  most  sig- 
nificant expression  of  social  chivalry,  the  settlement 
movement.  Many  another  constructive  activity,  initi- 
ated and  administered  by  those  children  of  privilege 
who  respond  to  moral  stimuli,  began  to  crystallize. 
New  every  morning,  fresh  every  evening,  leagues  were 
formed,  committees  appointed,  for  fighting  salient  evils : 
for  protecting  childhood,  cleansing  politics,  eliminating 
disease,  for  regulating  in  myriad  ways  the  unbridled 
passions  of  self-interest  and  greed  that  have  created 

17 


THE  DILEMMA 


our  unlovely  civilization.  That  new  crusade  whose  call 
we  had  answered  gathered  its  hosts  to  fight  the  ser- 
ried forces  of  industrial  and  social  wrong ;  every  day 
new  members  joined  it,  —  valiant  spirits,  happiest  of 
modern  men  and  women,  on  pilgrimage  to  the  Holy 
City  of  social  peace. 

It  was  splendid,  it  was  inspiring :  it  was  by  all  odds 
the  best  thing  that  the  modern  world  had  to  show. 
But  what  did  it  achieve  ?  What  had  they  done,  — 
all  the  laborious  committees?  Their  appeals  loaded 
our  breakfast  tables,  seeking  to  squeeze  a  little  more 
reluctant  money  from  those  comfortable  classes  who 
groaned  and  gave,  and  meantime  changed  not  one  iota, 
whether  nominal  Christians  or  not,  the  source  of  their 
incomes  or  their  standards  of  living.  Did  the  reforms 
get  accomplished  ?  Improvement  here  or  there  might 
be  noted  in  detail.  Many  individuals  lived  happier  and 
better  lives,  thanks  to  the  friendship  that  reached  them. 
Yet  the  hard  laws  of  industry  went  on  unchecked,  or 
were  checked  if  at  all  less  by  the  efforts  of  enlightened 
philanthropy  than  by  the  outraged  self-interest  of  the 
general  public  or  the  rising  demands  of  the  workers. 
Placed  in  the  balance  against  the  ugly  facts  of  modern 
civilization,  the  total  results  of  our  philanthropy  and 
our  reform  made  a  pretty  pitiful  show ! 

It  was  easy  to  say  that  sacrifice  must  not  count  re- 
sults. But  we  lived  in  an  age  when  labor  was  not  con- 
tent to  spend  itself  in  the  void.  We  toiled  for  a  cleaner 
and  more  decent  world,  where  industrial  slavery  should 
press  less  heavily,  where  childhood  should  have  chance 

18 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

and  manhood  scope ;  and  if  in  the  long  run  we  achieved 
little  toward  this  result  visible  to  the  naked  eye,  it  was 
our  plain  duty  to  pause  and  inquire  whether  we  were 
not  on  the  wrong  tack.  We  stood  off  therefore,  scru- 
tinized the  landscape  of  modern  life  in  its  great  masses 
of  light  and  shade,  and  asked  honestly  whether  the 
scene  had  been  perceptibly  brightened  by  the  efforts 
of  our  social  artists. 

The  answer  was  plain.  The  great  mass  of  misery, 
corruption  and  injustice  remained  practically  unaf- 
fected by  our  efforts.  With  the  conviction,  our  activi- 
ties lost  half  their  interest ;  and  it  came  to  pass  that 
the  generation  of  1890  stifled  within  the  opportunities 
which  would  have  exhilarated  the  generation  of  1848. 

To-day  —  if  we  may  transport  ourselves  for  a  mo- 
ment to  the  twentieth  century  —  there  are  still  many 
who  cling  to  philanthropy  and  many  who  cling  to  re- 
form. Yet  even  laggards  in  the  procession  may  be 
noted,  one  by  one,  abandoning  their  old  posts.  Perhaps 
no  one  is  left  cheerfully  to  hold  with  Dickens  that  the 
rectification  of  a  few  definite  abuses,  such  as  bad  schools, 
workhouses  and  prisons,  would  clear  the  social  air  and 
leave  a  Merrie  England  where  haphazard  Good  Nature 
could  be  Master  of  the  Revels.  Doubtless,  many  still 
entertain  a  like  pleasant  optimism  on  more  advanced 
lines ;  and  there  are  yet  more  to  believe  in  a  program 
of  gradual  changes  in  detail  which  shall  repair  the  so- 
cial structure  while  leaving  its  main  lines  and  founda- 
tions undisturbed.  It  is  probable  however  that  all  these 
groups,  especially  the  last,  are  steadily  diminishing  in 

19 


THE  DILEMMA 


size.  For  as  the  outlook  widens,  sadness  deepens,  and 
the  conviction  spreads  that  no  multiplication  of  specific 
or  local  remedies  will  bring  healing  to  our  social  ills. 

From  the  time  that  this  conviction  first  struck  in- 
ward, a  disillusion  graver  far  than  the  discouragements 
of  youth  settled  on  men's  spirits.  As  they  probed  ever 
deeper  into  the  causes  of  misery,  and  initiated  ever 
more  vital  measures  of  relief,  a  sense  of  paralysis  bound 
them.  They  came  to  despise  themselves  as  free  lances 
engaged  in  light  skirmishes  with  the  enemy,  while 
the  main  body  of  the  attacking  army  had  not  yet 
decided  on  its  line  of  march.  It  is  not  too  strong  to 
sum  up  the  situation  by  saying  that  when  the  twentieth 
century  opened,  the  inadequacy  of  mere  philanthropy 
was  generally  confessed,  while  a  considerable  propor- 
tion of  the  more  thoughtful  and  liberal  minds  of  the 
day  confronted  the  failure  of  reform. 

It  was  a  depressing  moment.  For  to  beat  about  the 
bush  at  the  foot  of  the  hill  is  one  thing,  and  it  is  quite 
another  to  fear  lest  one  have  mistaken  the  road  after 
long  climbing  in  the  heat  of  the  day.  Nor  did  we  get 
much  help  from  our  friends.  The  Voice  of  the  Church 
murmured  in  suave  consoling  accents  that  the  poor  we 
have  always  with  us,  while  the  Voice  of  Respectable 
Society  added  in  light  crescendo  the  reassuring  asser- 
tion that  human  nature  would  never  be  changed,  and 
that  men  would  always  require  the  fear  of  starvation 
for  an  incentive.  Refuted  by  that  faint  strange  hope 
that  would  not  down,  abhorred  in  the  depths  of  our 
being,  yet  echoed  by  our  dreary  fears,  the  cold  voices 

20 


THE  MODERN  ADVENTURE 

numbed  our  endeavors.  The  dark  modern  spectacle  of 
poverty  and  waste  rose  before  us  unaltered  in  the  main 
by  all  those  compassionate  activities  which  not  only  in 
our  generation  but  throughout  the  Christian  ages  had 
shed  upon  it  a  faint  phosphorescent  shining.  In  Lon- 
don, every  fourth  person  —  or  at  a  conservative  esti- 
mate, every  fifth1  —  was  dying  a  pauper,  in  workhouse, 
hospital,  or  asylum :  not  to  count  the  throngs  receiv- 
ing out-door  relief.  Thirty  per  cent  of  the  whole  popu- 
lation of  the  city  were  earning  less  than  a  guinea  a 
week  per  family,  and  were  classified  below  the  "  pov- 
erty line."  Tracts  of  tenement-house  streets  were  pro- 
scribed en  Hoc  by  the  insurance  societies.  Over  eight 
hundred  and  thirty  thousand  people  in  East  London 
alone  were  living  more  than  two  in  one  room  ;  nearly 
fifty  thousand  school-children  were  going  hungry ;  and 
the  "  unearned  increment "  of  the  city  amounted  to 
four  million  pounds  a  year. 

Where  was  comfort  to  be  found  ?  Not  in  personal 
sacrifice :  this  last  resort  of  self-deception  was  only 
a  final  indulgence.  Not  in  philanthropy  or  reform. 
While  the  mass  of  the  proletariat  languished  in-  a 
slavery  worse  than  that  of  the  serf  because  accompa- 
nied by  a  mocking  delusion  of  freedom,  while  the  hor- 
rors of  those  slums  and  factories  where  were  created 
these  material  values  by  which  we  lived  cried  aloud 
to  heaven,  such  painstaking  relief  as  we  could  afford  an 
'individual  here  or  there,  such  pursuit  of  evil  from  one 
lair  to  another  as  constituted  the  usual  program  of 
1  Facts  for  Socialists,  Fabian  Tract,  1899. 
21 


THE  DILEMMA 


reform,  only  brought  out  into  clearer  light  the  hideous 
extent  of  untouched  misery.  The  whole  heart  was  sick, 
the  whole  man  faint,  and  the  situation  seemed  a  device 
to  rouse  the  derisive  laughter  of  the  fiends  who  jeer 
at  human  endeavors  from  their  aerial  theatre.  While 
the  steerage  quarters  of  the  Ship  of  State  presented 
sights  of  so  squalid  a  wretchedness  to  first-cabin  pas- 
sengers idly  gazing  down  from  above,  and  the  forgot- 
ten stokers  plied  their  fearsome  trade  in  the  bowels  of 
the  vessel,  we  found  scant  consolation  in  regarding  the 
path  of  the  moon  on  the  waters  of  eternity,  or  in  toss- 
ing sweetmeats,  purloined  from  our  meals  in  the  upper 
cabin,  to  the  children  on  the  decks  below. 


CHAPTER  II 

OUR  WOULD-BE   GUIDES 


As  we  halted  in  these  straits,  it  was  natural  that 
we  should  peer  back  into  the  century  we  were  leaving, 
and  interrogate  more  sharply  than  ever  before  those 
guides  of  our  youth  who  had  sent  us  on  our  way.  Since 
the  Industrial  Revolution,  all  thinkers  had  faced  prac- 
tically the  same  situation  as  our  own,  and  they  spoke 
to  us  as  contemporaries.^  The  goodly  fellowship  on 
quest  for  justice  in  what  Carlyle  called  "  the  wilder- 
ness of  a  wide  world  in  an  atheistic  century  "  included 
members  from  every  European  country  and  from  the 
United  States.  If  we  had  listened  most  readily  to  those 
of  English  speech, — to  Emerson,  Thoreau,  Whitman, 
to  Carlyle,  Ruskin,  George  Eliot,  Matthew  Arnold, 
Edward  Carpenter,  —  none  the  less  had  we  lent  an 
ear  to  compelling  accents  from  across  the  Channel* 
The  melancholy  music  of  Leopardi,  Heine,  and  their 
generation  was  still  faintly  audible ;  the  earnest  tones 
of  Mazzini,  the  sonorous  harmonies  of  Victor  Hugo, 
were  to  be  caught  with  no  strain  to  the  listener.  Yet 
we  were  perhaps  more  insistently  held  by  the  mordant 
words  of  Ibsen,  Hauptmann,  Sudermann,  while  we 
found  it  hard  to  say  whether  that  dubious  measure  of 
Nietzsche  which  frightened  and  arrested  us  rose  from 

23 


THE  DILEMMA 


daemonic  depths  or  floated  down  from  the  heights 
attained  by  the  victorious  Superman.  Overmastering 
all  other  tones,  however,  something  of  "  the  large  utter- 
ance of  the  early  gods  "  reached  us  from  Eussia.  The 
great  novels  —  Dostoief sky's  pained  and  poignant 
studies  of  the  world's  anguish,  Tourgenieff's  sensitive 
delineation  of  the  stupor  of  the  oppressed  and  the  self- 
consuming  fever  of  the  would-be  redeemers  —  had 
prepared  us  for  a  greater  message ;  for  the  accusing, 
revealing  voice  of  the  one  man  who  had  traveled  be- 
yond our  modern  complex  bewilderments  into  a  region 
of  assured  conviction  deserving  the  name  of  faith,  — 
for  the  gospel  of  Leo  Tolstoy. 

At  the  bidding  of  these  men  we  had  long  ago  left 
our  own  people  and  our  father's  house,  to  enter  on  the 
quest  for  justice  and  brotherhood.  The  quest  evaded  us. 
Had  our  masters,  in  this  sad  juncture,  no  word  of  cheer? 

One  significant  encouragement  did  meet  us  instantly. 
We  saw  that  to  these  moderns  of  imaginative  vision, 
the  social  problem  and  the  religious  ase  inextricably 
blended  ;  and  we  could  not  fail  to  welcome  this  union 
as  a  triumph  of  democracy,  for  in  its  intensity  and  uni- 
versality it  marked  something  new  to  the  history  of 
thought.  A  theology  soaring  above  the  earth,  occupied 
with  metaphysical  abstractions,  such  as  had  impas- 
sioned the  ages  from  Augustine  to  Calvin  and  beyond, 
had  ceased  to  interest  though  it  might  still  be  pursued 
among  specialists.  John  Bunyan,  like  Jonathan  Ed- 
wards, had  beheld  the  soul  as  a  separate  entity,  awfully 
alone  in  the  universe  with  its  God.  But  it  was  man 

24 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


yearning  toward  fellowship  whom  Mazzini  and  Tolstoy 
contemplated,  —  man  reaching  out  to  the  Divine  and 
Infinite  chiefly  if  not  wholly  through  relations  to  his 
brother-men.  People  were  as  much  concerned  with  re- 
ligion as  ever;  but  Carlyle's  "  Sartor  Resartus  "  passed 
abruptly  from  the  breathless  mysticism  of  a  chapter 
on  Natural  Supernaturalism  to  a  scathing  study  of 
modern  Helotage ;  it  was  Tolstoy's  social  conscience 
that  spurred  him  to  formulate  afresh  his  religious  faith ; 
in  Nietzsche,  the  denial  of  God  brought  in  its  train 
the  denial  of  democracy  and  compassion.  In  all  this, 
there  might  conceivably  be  loss :  there  was  also  assured 
gain.  For  it  meant  that  the  deep  unity  of  life  began 
to  be  perceived,  and  that  while  in  the  outer  world 
class-barriers  might  be  high  and  hard  as  ever,  in  the 
world  within  distinctions  were  vanishing,  and  "  water- 
tight compartments  "  becoming  a  thing  of  the  past.  As- 
piration, in  the  pre-Revolutionary  schools,  might  have 
been  pictured  as  a  Blake  -  like  figure,  hands  clasped 
above  its  head,  struggling  to  free  its  feet  from  earth 
and  to  sweep  upward  into  the  deeps  of  celestial  air. 
The  type  of  nineteenth  -  century  aspiration  was  sug- 
gested rather  by  the  relief  made  by  George  Barnard  the 
sculptor  for  the  tomb  of  a  Swedish  philanthropist,  — 
two  comrades,  pressing  toward  each  other  through  an 
inert  mass  of  opposing  rock,  just  touching  finger-tips, 
yet  straining  with  a  power  that  must  prevail.  Their 
heads  are  bent  earthward  with  the  intensity  of  their 
effort ;  when  the  embrace  they  crave  is  attained  at  last 
they  may  look  up  together  to  the  stars. 

25 


THE  DILEMMA 


This  union  of  religious  and  social  passion  in  all  the 
great  masters  reinforced  and  comforted  our  own  in- 
stincts ;  for  it  was  the  very  condition  of  our  activity, 
the  medium  in  which  our  being  moved.  Yet  it  was 
only  a  condition  and  a  medium.  It  simply  gave  us  the 
key  to  which  our  music  must  be  pitched.  We  who 
longed  to  achieve  harmony,  who  were  producing  only 
discords,  turned  to  listen  to  our  leaders.  What  unison 
among  them  ?  What  suggestions,  for  the  music  of  the 
future,  did  they  offer  our  attentive  ears  ? 

II 

Alas,  we  found  agreement  enough,  —  but  in  ne- 
gation only !  Discontent  with  civilization  marks  to  an 
astonishing  degree  the  higher  reaches  of  nineteenth- 
century  thought.  Social  criticism  is  no  new  thing ; 
but  in  earlier  times  it  had  attacked  foibles,  not  found- 
ations. The  greater  the  age,  the  more  it  has  exulted 
in  its  own  glory.  Elizabethan  England,  the  Florence 
of  the  Renascence^  the  Greece  of  Pericles,  felt  a  proud 
and  eager  patriotism  thinly  disguised  by  the  captious- 
ness  of  social  censors  and  leading  to  delighted  self- 
glorification.  Complacency  has  not  been  lacking  to 
the  Age  of  Steam,  but  it  has  not  come  from  the  men 
of  imagination  and  vision.  In  the  utterances  of  gen- 
ius coming  from  every  European  country,  restlessness 
deepens  into  dissatisfaction,  and  abhorrence  at  times 
into  despair. 

Looking  back,  and  gathering  our  impressions,  we 
could  distinguish  in  this  general  revulsion  two  re- 

26 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


current  strains,  often  blended,  yet  originally  distinct. 
Through  the  decades,  from  the  days  of  Byron  and  Leo- 
pardi,  rose  the  exasperated  protest  of  the  stifled  Ego, 
clamoring,  and  in  vain,  for  power  under  modern  con- 
ditions to  attain  a  man's  full  stature,  to  achieve  sincer- 
ity, fulfillment,  peace.  We  heard  outraged  hatred  of 
restraint  and  defiance  of  convention,  voiced  so  haught- 
ily by  Byron,  ringing  sardonic  and  brilliant  at  a  later 
date  through  the  work  of  Ibsen  and  the  Northerners. 
In  thought  like  that  of  Edward  Carpenter  it  allied 
itself  to  Oriental  mysticism,  paradoxically  drawing  the 
soul  aloof  into  isolation  in  the  very  name  of  unity. 
In  Emerson  had  been  its  mildest,  most  spiritual  ex- 
pression. In  Nietzsche  it  found  its  apogee.  The  indi- 
vidualistic revolt !  Germinated  in  that  denial  of  sin, 
that  arrogant  confidence  in  the  sanctity  of  natural 
life,  which  marked  the  pre-Revolutionary  schools,  it 
was  tossed,  a  strong  ferment,  into  the  world  of  the 
Revolution.  If,  as  we  were  bidden,  we  were  to  adore 
our  own  humanity,  why  not  indulge  it?  Why  not 
trust  its  every  impulse,  resenting  all  that  fettered  the 
free  play  of  desire  ?  Challenging  marriage,  reacting 
from  all  social  forms  of  religion,  never  satisfied  and 
never  stilled,  expressing  itself  indifferently  through 
music,  philosophy,  letters,  and  life,  this  Spirit  of  Re- 
volt has  roamed,  an  unquiet  guest,  through  the  stern 
ways  of  modern  civilization :  and  where  is  the  man  or 
woman  who  has  never  listened  to  its  lure? 

Yet   in   our  breasts  it  has  encountered,    now   to 
embrace,  now  to  oppose,  anothe^orce,   centrifugal 

27 


THE  DILEMMA 


where  it  is  centripetal;  bringing  absolution  from 
egotism,  tending  to  minimize  rather  than  to  stress  all 
personal  claims  on  the  universe :  that  pity  for  human- 
ity, ever  latent,  sometimes  potent,  in  the  press  and 
clamor  of  self-seeking  modern  life.  In  the  spasmodic 
pages  of  Rousseau,  in  the  measured  lines  of  Cowper, 
in  pages  not  to  be  numbered  as  the  century  goes  on,  a 
great  compassion  has  contemplated  with  heartache  not 
to  be  quieted  the  manifold  miseries  of  proletariat  and 
privileged  alike,  and  has  cried  aloud  that  its  brothers, 
rich  and  poor,  are  so  fast  in  prison  that  they  cannot 
get  out.  Restless  compunction  has  accompanied  the 
cry;  and  just  as  self-assertion  has  exalted  itself  into 
a  defiant  philosophy,  self-effacement  has  focused  itself 
in  a  devoted  religion.  A  blind  but  disinterested  grop- 
ing after  the  happiness  of  all  was  as  clear  to  the  dis- 
cerning mind  from  the  time  of  Shelley  all  down  the 
century,  as  the  grasp  at  the  happiness  of  each.  Many 
a  man  who  has  spoken  the  word  of  power  has  had, 
like  Victor  Hugo,  like  William  Morris,  like  John 
Ruskin,  no  personal  grievance  against  the  world.  In 
the  English  school  after  the  days  of  Byron  and  the 
Romantic  Revolt,  social  and  chivalric  feeling  may  be 
said  on  the  whole  to  dominate  the  individualistic  note  ; 
in  the  French  group  of  Forty-eight  social  aspiration 
was  lambent  but  helpless  ;  in  Mazzini  it  soared  in 
flaming  ideals  of  social  and  political  freedom.  In  the 
great  Russians  we  noted  for  once  an  all  but  com- 
plete fusion  of  the  two  impulses,  for  there  individual- 
ism at  its  intensest  is  motived  by  purest  compassion, 

28 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


and  leads  to  a  solution  of  the  social  problem  that 
though  private  would  fain  hold  itself  to  be  the  solu- 
tion for  all  men. 

So  egotism  and  altruism  found  themselves  allies  for 
the  time  being  in  revolt  against  a  social  order  in  which 
both  instincts  were  cruelly  thwarted ;  and  so  the 
call  to  sacrifice  and  the  call  to  dominate  met  confus- 
edly in  the  literature  of  the  century  as  they  met  in  our 
own  hearts,  and  united  to  challenge  civilization  as  it 
was. 

Over  this  revolt  we  felt  impelled  to  make  a  longer 
pause.  And  first  we  glanced  at  the  individualistic 
schools,  where  the  indictment  is  most  sharply  defined, 
though  not  most  intensely  felt. 

Here  was  Ibsen,  for  instance  :  a  startling  presence, 
recently  discovered  at  the  close  of  the  last  century, 
whose  audacity  in  manner  as  well  as  message  was  pro- 
ducing hot  discussion  in  artistic  circles  no  less  than 
in  those  preoccupied  with  ideas.  His  work  had  passed 
from  symbolic  mysticism  to  experiments  in  the  far- 
thest reaches  of  dramatic  realism,  yet  through  both 
methods  the  spirit  of  negation  spoke  alone.  Sympathies 
were  consistently  routed  by  the  stern  perception  of  fact. 
Brand,  refuser  of  compromise,  dear  to  the  author's 
heart  as  he  shouts  "  All  or  Nothing !  "  is  mercilessly 
worsted  in  the  battle  of  life.  From  Julian,  indignant 
champion  of  Pagan  glories,  is  wrested  reluctant  defer- 
ence before  the  religion  of  defeat.  Peer  Gynt,  the  man 
capable  of  maintaining  superb  delusions  in  the  face 
of  supreme  degradations,  is  no  hero  of  idealism  but  a 

29 


THE  DILEMMA 


poor  creature  after  all.  The  curious  verse,  hot  with 
symbolic  imaginings,  yields  to  ironical  prose,  which 
arraigns  our  mean  conventions  with  an  honesty  and 
vigor  that  brought  a  nervous  shock  to  a  whole  decade. 
It  passes  in  scornful  review  the  worthlessness  of  the 
Pillars  of  Society,  the  awful  curse  of  inheritance,  the 
Dolls'  House  in  which  women  live,  the  rout  of  sen- 
timent by  that  modern  Vittoria  Corombona,  Hedda 
Gabler,  —  a  lady  whom  no  one  in  love  with  life  would 
find  interesting  enough  to  describe,  —  the  will-o'-the- 
wisp  Aspiration  that  leads  a  Master-Builder  to  fling 
himself  from  the  apex  of  his  own  building.  Through  the 
tame  bourgeois  society  that  Ibsen  pictures  in  all  its  in- 
credible flatness,  pulse  the  same  demands  of  suffocated 
persons  for  warmth,  life,  freedom,  that  break  in  the 
Jacobean  drama  like  the  roar  of  cosmic  surge  and  surf 
against  the  silence  of  eternal  law.  Times  have  changed 
—  surely  for  the  worse  —  between  the  days  of  the 
"  White  Devil "  and  those  of  «  Hedda  Gabler."  For  the 
breakwater  against  which  desire  now  hurls  itself  in  vain 
is  erected  rather  by  society  than  by  nature,  and  an  ex- 
asperated sense  of  its  artificiality  raises  the  struggle 
to  the  point  of  madness.  Domestic  amenities,  political 
moralities,  artistic  aspirations,  crumble  to  dust  touched 
by  the  finger  of  the  satirist.  What  survives  is  a  thwarted 
Will,  —  vicious  or  honest,  one  is  never  quite  sure 
which,  —  asserting  itself  in  helpless  defiance  above  the 
debris  of  a  civilization  viewed  with  unmitigated  con- 
tempt. In  view  of  this  steady  trend  of  Ibsen's  art,  it 
was  no  surprise  to  find  Brandes  writing  of  him,  that 

30 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


"  full-blooded  egoism  "  "  forced  him  for  a  time  to  re- 
gard what  concerned  himself  as  the  only  matter  of 
any  consequence."  When  the  dramatist  writes  in  his 
own  person  he  is  equally  pessimistic,  whether  he  con- 
sider the  destiny  of  individuals  or  the  fate  of  nations. 
There  was  a  change  in  his  political  views.  He  aban- 
doned the  ardent  faith  in  the  principle  of  nationality, 
which  fanned  Scandinavian  patriotism,  and  became 
"  a  Teuton,"  preferring  that  the  life  of  his  fatherland 
should  blend  with  that  of  Germany.  Such  a  change 
might  conceivably  arise  from  a  widening  international 
enthusiasm.  Ibsen's  general  attitude  however  suggests 
a  surrender  rather  than  a  broadening  of  faith :  and 
this  view  is  strengthened  as  we  realize  the  deep  hos- 
tility to  the  State,  the  political  unit,  that  breathes 
through  his  later  work.  "  The  State  must  be  abol- 
ished," he  writes :  "  in  that  revolution  I  will  take 
part."  Once  in  a  while  there  is  a  sad  but  noble  note : 
"  So  long  as  a  people  can  sorrow,  so  long  will  that 
people  live."  But  pessimism  in  regard  to  reforms  is 
habitually  absolute  :  "  From  special  reforms  I  hope  ; 
nothing ;  the  whole  race  is  on  the  wrong  track."  In 
another  passage,  he  speaks  his  mind  with  character- 
istic brevity  :  "  There  are  actually  moments  when  the 
whole  history  of  the  world  appears  to  me  like  one  great 
shipwreck,  and  the  only  important  thing  appears  to 
be  to  save  oneself."  Art  of  this  temper  may  clear  the 
air,  but  it  hardly  helped  us  to  find  our  way  through 
life's  tangle. 

Influenced  by  Ibsen,  the  Northern  schools  of  novel 
31 


THE  DILEMMA 


and  drama  rarely  got  beyond  him.  In  realism  or  ro- 
mance, the  inward  conflicts  of  an  Ego  that  claims 
gratification  as  its  right,  yet  finds  this  very  gratifica- 
tion deadly  to  itself  as  well  as  to  others,  is  the  reiterated 
theme.  We  saw  it  in  Magda,  cruelly  gentle,  failing  to 
keep  her  own  soul  alive  and  dubiously  benefiting  the 
soul  of  any  one  else;  in  Heinrich  of  "The  Sunken 
Bell,"  lured  by  the  bewitchments  of  Rautendelein  as 
the  Master-Builder  by  Hilda,  only  to  doom  that  spirit 
of  natural  joy  to  coldest  nuptials  with  the  Nickelmann, 
and  to  break  his  own  heart  because  he  has  murdered 
domestic  affection  through  his  flight  from  the  warm 
dull  ways  of  human  fellowship.  Had  not  the  English 
race  caught  the  infection  ?  Till  close  on  our  day,  this 
revel  of  revolt  has  gone  on  unchecked  in  problem- 
play  and  story.  It  passes  with  alarming  swiftness 
from  literature  to  life  and  back  again  ;  centring  as  is 
natural  in  rebellion  against  the  convention  of  marriage, 
but  widening  its  scope,  to  view  all  restraining  tradi- 
tion with  annoyed  and  supercilious  distaste.  The  Jolly 
Beggars  of  Burns  need  no  longer  troll  their  outra- 
geous ditty  from  the  friendly  shelter  of  a  dilapidated 
barn :  — 

"  A  fig  for  those  by  law  protected, 

Liberty  's  a  glorious  feast  : 
Courts  for  cowards  were  erected,  — 
Churches  built  to  please  the  priest." 

Persons  of  the  best  breeding  and  most  delicate  man- 
ners on  every  hand  are  repeating  in  private  a  refined 
and  intellectualized  version  of  the  same  song. 

32 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


This  individualistic  passion  has  at  times  used  demo- 
cratic language ;  but  on  the  whole  the  leveling  instincts 
of  democracy  are  obnoxious  to  it,  for  its  central  im- 
pulse is  separatist  and  hence  aristocratic.  And  it  was 
left  to  a  more  daring  genius  even  than  Ibsen  to  push 
its  logic  to  an  extreme.  In  Friedrich  Nietzsche,  vault- 
ing negation  certainly  overleaps  itself,  and  "  falls  on 
the  other,"  into  a  topsy-turvy  world,  where  the  most 
drastic  denials  suddenly  appear  as  supreme  affirma- 
tions. With  how  alluring  a  play  of  feeling  and  im- 
agery did  he  attack  the  smug  assumptions  of  a  nomi- 
nal democracy  and  a  faded  Christianity !  With  what 
splendor,  what  audacity,  he  asserted  the  aristocratic 
ideal,  in  its  repudiation  of  pity  as  weakness,  and  its 
faith  in  dominion  as  the  end  of  life !  There  is  always 
cause  for  gratitude  when  a  tendency  comes  out  into 
the  open ;  in  Nietzsche,  we  welcomed  with  relief  the 
justification  of  our  uneasy  fears  concerning  the  ulti- 
mate logic  of  these  schools  of  revolt :  — 

Grant  me,  O  divine  protecting  Muses,  if  beyond  good 
and  evil  you  exist,  a  glance  that  I  may  cast  on  some  being 
absolutely  complete,  successful,  happy,  powerful,  trium- 
phant, from  whom  there  is  still  something  to  be  feared. 
For  here  is  where  we  are :  the  leveling  and  diminishing  of 
man  in  Europe  conceals  our  greatest  danger.  .  .  .  Nothing 
incites  us  to  become  greater  to-day  :  we  foresee  that  every- 
thing is  humbling  itself,  to  be  reduced  more  and  more  to 
something  more  inoffensive,  slighter,  more  prudent,  more 
mediocre,  till  the  superlative  insignificance  of  the  Christian 
virtues  is  reached.  .  .  .  There  is  the  fatal  doom  of  Europe : 
having  ceased  to  fear  man,  we  have  ceased  to  love  him,  to 

33 


THE  DILEMMA 


venerate  him,  to  hope  in  him,  to  will  with  him.  The  very 
aspect  of  man  bores  us  to-day.   We  are  tired  of  humanity. 

And  again  :  When  will  the  schools  of  compassion 
triumph  in  their  bad  work  ? 

When  they  shall  succeed  in  forcing  into  the  conscious- 
ness of  happy  people  the  misery  of  others  so  that  they  will 
blush  for  their  happiness  [was  this  not  precisely  what  we 
had  been  doing  ?]  and  say  to  one  another :  It  is  a  disgrace 
to  be  happy  in  the  presence  of  so  many  miseries.  What  a 
portentous  error,  for  the  fortunate,  the  happy,  the  power- 
ful, to  doubt  their  right  to  happiness !  Away  with  this  up- 
turned world !  Away  with  this  shameful  weakening  of  feel- 
ing !  Let  not  the  sick  infect  the  well !  Is  it  their  duty  to 
make  themselves  into  nurses  and  doctors?  Not  at  all!  The 
superior  element  must  not  lower  itself  to  become  the  instru- 
ment of  the  inferior,  the  pathos  of  distance  must  separate 
duties  to  all  eternity.  .  .  .  They  are  the  only  guarantee  of 
the  future,  the  only  people  responsible  for  humanity.  But 
if  they  are  to  be  competent  for  what  they  have  to  do,  they 
cannot  be  allowed  liberty  to  act  as  physicians,  saviors,  con- 
solers. Let  in  pure  air !  Create  solitude  if  you  must.  But 
flee  the  neighborhood  of  humanity's  hospitals.  Thus,  my 
friends,  we  can  still  protect  ourselves,  at  least  for  a  time, 
against  the  two  most  terrible  contagions  that  menace  us : 
deep  disgust,  and  deep  pity  for  men.  ...  I  understood 
that  this  ethic  of  compassion  which  was  spreading  con- 
stantly was  the  most  disquieting  symptom  of  our  European 
culture. 

So  Nietzsche  taught  us  to  burn  what  we  had  adored: 
and  this  reversal  of  our  moral  standards  carried  with 
it  the  social  and  political  implications  to  be  expected. 
In  the  state,  "  the  slow  suicide  of  all  calls  itself  life." 

34 


OUK  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


"  Far  too  many  men  come  into  the  world :  the  state 
was  invented  for  the  sake  of  those  who  are  super- 
fluous." "The  state?  What  is  that?  Open  your  ears, 
for  I  am  going  to  speak  to  you  of  the  death  of  the 
peoples."  "  Where  the  state  ends,  —  look  my  bro- 
thers! Do  you  not  see  the  rainbow  and  the  bridge 
to  the  superman  ?  "  Contempt  for  the  many  followed 
of  course :  "  See  those  superfluous !  They  steal  .  .  .  the 
treasures  of  the  wise,  and  call  their  theft  civilization." 
How  about  brotherly  love  ?  "  Do  I  advise  you  to  love 
your  neighbor?  Rather  would  I  advise  you  to  flee 
your  neighbor,  and  pursue  that  which  is  afar."  Man, 
to  take  refuge  from  this  far  beauty,  this  phantom  of 
the  Ideal,  "  runs  away  to  his  neighbor."  How  about 
that  "  Eldest  of  things  divine  Equality,"  so  passion- 
ately hymned  of  Shelley  ?  To  Nietzsche,  she  is  a  poi- 
sonous tarantula,  with  the  revolutionary  triangle  on  her 
back. 

With  these  preachers  of  Equality  I  will  not  be  confused. 
Men  are  not  equal,  and  they  must  not  become  so.  By  a 
thousand  bridges  and  a  thousand  roads  they  must  hasten 
toward  the  future :  and  between  them  ever  more  wars  and 
more  inequalities  must  intervene.  .  .  .  My  brothers,  I  place 
before  you  a  new  Table  of  the  Law :  Harden  yourselves. 

Let  us  be  candid :  it  brought  refreshment  and  relief 
when  first  we  met  it, — this  brutally  potent  and  poetic 
revulsion  from  the  social  idealism  born  of  democracy. 

But  the  refreshment  was  short-lived,  for  the  virus 
of  compassion  hated  by  Nietzsche  was  too  inward  to 
expel.  He  had  felt  this  himself.  "Woe!  Bitten  by 

35 


THE  DILEMMA 


the  tarantula,  my  old  enemy !  "  he  cried.  "  With  her 
certitude  and  her  divine  beauty,  she  has  bitten  my 
finger !  "  Assuredly  she  had  bitten  ours,  and  no  anti- 
dote availed  to  set  our  system  free  and  turn  us  into 
aristocrats  again.  The  trouble  with  most  of  us  was 
that  we  were  mean-spirited.  We  did  not  want  to  be 
supermen,  at  least  not  unless  everybody  else  had  a 
fair  chance  of  getting  to  be  supermen  too.  Our  heart 
went  with  Paracelsus  :  — 

Make  no  more  giants,  God, 
But  elevate  the  race  at  once,  — 

a  sentiment  which  Nietzsche  would  have  considered 
quite  worthy  of  that  mediseval  fanatic. 

If  we  followed  the  movement  of  individualistic  re- 
volt to  an  extreme,  we  could  hardly  avoid  ending  in 
the  Nietzschean  attitude.  If  we  tossed  defiance  at 
it,  and  yielded  ourselves  to  the  schools  of  pity  in  de- 
spite, the  spectacle  offered  us  was  no  more  reassur- 
ing. Indeed,  the  indictment  of  modern  life  from  this 
new  point  of  view  was  even  more  heart-racking  than 
from  the  old.  The  flash-light  turned  by  Ibsen  and  his 
compeers  on  the  discontents  and  diseases  of  the  priv- 
ileged classes,  certainly  did  not  help  us  to  consider 
these  classes,  in  which  we  were  for  the  most  part 
included,  as  a  worthy  product  of  great  sacrifice.  We 
passed  now  to  contemplate  the  sacrificed,  —  the  pro- 
ducers of  the  world,  the  purveyors  to  its  physical 
needs,  as  literature  during  the  century  had  very  grad- 
ually awaked  to  them  and  revealed  them.  At  first 

36 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


the  revelation  had  been  absurdly  inadequate :  even  in 
our  own  days  it  was  superficial  enough :  yet  as  demo- 
cracy advanced,  sympathetic  insight  into  the  life  of 
the  poor  had  become  more  and  more  enlightened. 
What  need  to  pause  over  the  picture?  In  France, 
Russia,  England,  Germany,  fiction  had  inexorably 
shown  "Les  Miserables,"  "  The  People  of  the  Abyss," 
to  the  leisured  and  comfortable  classes :  and  every 
revealing  touch  was  corroborated  by  our  own  experi- 
ence. Shame  kindled  to  fire  the  relentless  analysis  of 
the  results  of  the  social  revolution  given  on  broader 
lines  by  the  great  social  essayists.  Wherever  we 
turned  to  literature,  we  were  called  to  contemplate  a 
world  where  Helots  and  Dandies  divided  the  stage  and 
where  Mammonism  and  Dilettantism  shared  the  throne. 
True,  there  were  more  cheerful  aspects.  Even  in  fiction, 
certainly  out  of  it,  many  modern  people  were  living 
healthy  and  happy  lives,  and  this  was  a  fact  always 
wholesome  to  remember.  But  for  us  it  did  not  silence 
the  Voice  of  the  Accuser.  It  is  of  little  avail  to  tell 
a  man  whose  lungs  are  diseased  that  there  is  nothing 
the  matter  with  his  digestion ;  in  the  social  body  as 
in  the  physical  the  wrong  of  a  part  incommodes  the 
whole.  The  centres  of  disease  in  modern  life  were  so 
many  that  it  was  small  wonder  if  we  rose  from  the 
pages  of  our  critics  crying  out  again  with  the  old  pain 
born  of  personal  adventure.  What  point  to  diagnosis 
unless  it  lead  to  remedies?  To  the  schools  of  egotism 
and  the  schools  of  compassion  we  put  the  old,  the 
never-silenced  question,  Show  us  the  Way  of  Health  ! 

37 


THE  DILEMMA 


III 

Answers  were  by  no  means  wanting :  but  the  pre- 
scriptions were  as  many  as  the  speakers.  At  first,  the 
attempt  to  classify  them  brought  only  discouragement ; 
yet  earnest  thinking,  if  it  persevered,  found  through 
endless  diversity  of  detail  two  chief  constructive 
principles,  to  one  or  the  other  of  which  all  the  best 
social  idealism  of  the  nineteenth  century  in  its  more 
positive  phases  was  at  one  point  or  another  related. 
On  one  of  the  banners  around  which  idealism  ral- 
lied was  inscribed  the  motto,  Civilization  must  be 
moralized !  On  the  other,  Civilization  must  be  aban- 
doned ! 

The  plea  to  moralize  was  superficial  enough  at  times. 
There  had  been  many  to  believe  with  Dickens  and 
Victor  Hugo  that  all  the  world  needed  to  set  it  right 
was  a  lavish  application  of  sentiment.  Yet  much 
thought  that  rallied  round  this  banner  was  of  a  better 
type,  — searching,  rich  in  suggestion,  and  supplemented 
by  an  immense  amount  of  ardent  action.  The  infusion 
of  moral  idealism  into  a  situation  unchanged  if  not 
unchallenged  was  looked  to  by  many  wise  men  all 
through  the  century  as  the  one  sure  path  to  social 
welfare.  Carlyle  had  united  with  his  still  vital  denun- 
ciations a  rousing  call  to  act,  accompanied  by  no 
clear  hint  of  the  way  to  follow.  His  disciples,  notably 
Ruskiii,  pushed  his  teachings  further,  laid  down  a  new 
chivalry  of  sacrifice  and  service  for  all  men,  especially 
those  "  captains  of  industry,"  the  great  manufacturers 

38 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


hailed  by  Carlyle  as  masters  of  the  future,  and  sum- 
moned the  children  of  privilege  to  a  new  ascesis,  — 
a  disciplined  life  that  should  return  to  the  Platonic 
counsel  of  the  simplification  of  wants,  and  refrain,  not 
in  the  name  of  asceticism  but  in  that  of  love,  from  all 
that  luxury  by  which  human  existence  was  wasted  or 
ravaged. 

Still  distrustful  of  democracy,  the  writers  of  this 
school  evoked  for  us  an  attractive  picture,  —  an  or- 
ganized feudalism  with  communistic  features,  —  a 
society  "  in  layers,"  like  Mr.  Galsworthy's  Chinese 
pagoda,  where  heaven-born  inequalities  gave  scope  for 
right  interplay  of  obedience  and  authority,  in  a  frame 
of  immutable  justice  that  protected  the  world  it  gov- 
erned from  either  growth  or  decay.  Less  logically 
worked  out,  similar  ideals  underlay  nearly  all  cur- 
rent philanthropy  or  reform.  Mazzini,  though  he  wel- 
comed the  democracy  which  Englishmen  still  viewed 
with  distrust,  had  the  same  faith  in  moral  passion 
as  the  one  lever  in  the  emancipation  of  the  world. 
The  twentieth  century  would  hardly  consider  him  a 
radical.  Afire  with  Republican  zeal,  he  was  possessed 
by  the  superseded  belief  in  the  mystic  potency  of 
political  forms ;  private  property  represented  to  him 
"the  activity  of  the  body,  just  as  thought  represents 
the  activity  of  the  mind."  His  ardent  aspiration  still 
has  power  to  thrill ;  his  program  is  forgotten.  Preach- 
ing, experiment  on  the  same  lines,  filled  the  century. 
Let  the  system  stand  as  it  was,  unmodified  at  least 
by  any  outward  change  ;  let  the  employer  deal  justly 

39 


THE  DILEMMA 


and  kindly,  having  less  regard  to  balances  of  expe- 
diency than  to  those  of  justice ;  let  the  employed  give 
faithful  service,  helping  his  master  to  govern  aright 
even  to  the  extent,  as  oddly  suggested  by  Matthew 
Arnold,  of  improving  middle-class  schools;  let  the 
landlord  keep  his  property  in  repair,  and  the  tenant 
be  induced  by  some  mysterious  means  to  become  clean 
instead  of  dirty :  in  a  word,  leave  the  old  relations 
alone,  but  promote  a  moral  revival  within  them, — 
and  the  miracle  would  be  accomplished  and  our  social 
wrongs  be  healed. 

Thus  the  conscience,  with  little  assistance  from  the 
mind,  was  to  solve  our  difficulties.  The  plan  was 
simple,  it  was  even  magnificent,  but  it  did  not  work. 
Of  that  fact,  we,  with  an  increasing  number  of  people, 
had  become  painfully  aware.  Statesmen,  economists, 
reformers,  social  workers,  had  been  doing  their  best 
for  well-nigh  half  a  century  with  these  solutions; 
and  the  onward  movement  of  life  had,  not  to  all  minds 
but  to  an  increasing  number,  simply  discredited  their 
hypothesis.  Men  seeking  to  apply  these  hypotheses 
found  themselves  hurtling  against  vast  forces,  faintly 
understood,  not  to  be  thwarted  nor  conquered  by  their 
most  gallant  efforts.  This  very  attempt  to  moralize 
the  present  order  by  means  of  individual  conversions 
or  detail  reforms,  had  brought  us  into  the  impasse  in 
which  we  stood  baffled. 

Was  there  any  alternative  ?  Yes !  Many  people, 
like  ourselves,  turned  away  saddened  or  indifferent 
from  all  efforts  to  moralize  the  world  as  it  was,  as 

40 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


from  an  impossible  task ;  and  with  cheerful  alacrity, 
they  bade  us  abandon  it.  "  Civilization  :  its  Cause  and 
Cure,"  was  the  text  of  their  teaching,  and  its  burden 
was  "  The  Call  of  the  Wild."  Very  fascinating  is  the 
appeal  of  the  anarchists  from  Thoreau  to  Edward  Car- 
penter as  they  bid  us  shake  the  dust  of  society  and 
artifice  from  our  feet,  and  in  joyous  liberty  take  on  our 
lips  the  Song  of  the  Open  Road. 

The  Return  to  Nature !  that  summons  has  never 
ceased  to  echo  through  the  heart  since  the  days  of  Rous- 
seau. It  is  a  finer  form  of  personal  revolt  than  that 
which  agitates  the  forlorn  and  sullen  folk  of  Ibsen's 
drama,  for  it  is  touched  with  poetry,  hope,  and  fresh- 
ness. Clear  and  musical,  it  rang  through  the  best  so- 
cial idealism  of  the  new  world,  whether  with  Emerson 
it  allured  to  a  delicate  spiritual  detachment  only,  or 
through  the  heartier  accents  of  Whitman  braced  to 
courageous  rejection  of  the  conventional  and  false,  and 
a  vigorous  reshaping  of  the  visible  life.  A  myriad 
voices  in  the  old  world  take  up  the  siren  strain.  Its 
allurements  can  never  be  forgotten. 

And  yet,  the  more  we  thought  the  more  sadly  we 
perceived  that  it  is  a  call  to  fettered  men. 

For  unless  one  retreated  to  a  tropical  climate,  as 
Carpenter  indeed  somewhere  suggests  that  we  all  do, 
one  would  have  to  wear  clothes.  And  every  fibre  of 
those  clothes  would  sing  persistently  in  the  ear  the 
modern  Song  of  the  Shirt :  recalling  the  intermin- 
able array  of  men  and  women,  —  clerks,  dressmakers, 
sewing-girls,  weavers,  back  to  the  tenders  of  silk- 

41 


THE  DILEMMA 


worms  or  gatherers  of  cotton,  who  have  given  life  and 
labor,  often  under  cruelly  unjust  conditions,  that  we 
may  be  clad.  The  same  message,  silent  to  sense,  clam- 
orous to  imagination,  rises  from  all  the  simplest  and 
most  inalienable  trapping  of  life.  Abandon  ?  We  can- 
not. Our  every  movement  precludes  the  possibility. 
Separate  ourselves  as  we  will  from  our  brothers,  with- 
draw to  whatever  depth  we  will  into  the  wilderness,  we 
may  not,  short  of  suicide,  refuse  the  gifts  they  offer. 
To  fall  back  on  a  wholesome  and  normal  personal 
existence,  and  rest  there  satisfied,  is  to  reject  that 
reciprocity  of  sacrifice  which  is  the  first  law  of  de- 
cent life. 

And  what  said  Tolstoy,  —  the  pathetic  Titan,  who 
rose  head  and  shoulders  above  all  the  other  guides  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  —  the  only  spiritual  leader  of 
our  day  who  can  be  said  to  have  attained  international 
importance  ? 

Here  was  a  man  whose  searching  simplicity  had 
power  to  touch  our  most  inward  wounds.  From  the 
story  of  Levin  to  that  of  Nekhludoff,  it  was  given  him 
to  write  large,  with  honesty  only  equaled  by  his  sub- 
tlety, the  spiritual  autobiography  of  his  age.  In  Tol- 
stoy alone  all  the  forces  potent  in  the  social  idealism 
of  the  last  century  appear  united.  The  personal  re- 
volt from  modern  civilization  has  rarely  been  so  elo- 
quently phrased,  yet  it  was  inspired  by  no  egotism 
but  by  purest  passionate  pity.  His  was  a  nature  so 
exalted  that  the  most  private  needs  and  cravings 
could  be  satisfied  only  when  love  should  be  freed 

42 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


from  remorse;  and  individual  aspiration  and  social 
compunction  were  thus  woven  in  one  strand.  In  the 
expression  of  the  deep  and  complex  suffering  that 
results  from  the  union,  he  has  surely  no  equals  in  the 
literature  of  this  or  any  time.  And  as  egotism  here  soars 
till  it  is  one  with  altruism  in  the  freedom  of  the  upper 
air,  so  the  two  constructive  impulses  pressing  toward 
personal  harmony  and  social  redemption  which  as  we 
have  seen  severally  dominate  one  or  another  seeker 
of  the  century,  are  here  indistinguishably  harmonized. 
To  moralize  society  was  the  one  central  aim  of  Tol- 
stoy :  but  his  method  was  to  abandon  it.  The  escape 
from  civilization  including  even  its  finest  assets  of  art 
and  manners  was  the  constant  theme  of  his  philosophy, 
the  experiment  of  his  noblest  characters,  the  spur  to 
the  final  tragedy  of  his  last  days  and  death.  But  in 
such  escape,  indefinitely  repeated,  he  saw  not  merely 
the  way  to  personal  peace,  but  the  one  salvation  for 
society.  The  rich  organic  fullness  of  Tolstoy's  life, 
thought,  and  art,  gives  us  the  most  significant  social 
solution  the  last  century  had  to  offer,  apart  from  the 
one  great  solution  which  we  have  not  yet  approached  : 
and  with  eagerness  we  turned  to  him  in  our  hour 
of  need. 

It  is  in  the  inimitable  pages  of  "  What  Is  To  Be 
Done  "  that  he  most  fully  traces  his  experience.  The 
story  he  tells  is  in  large  degree  the  same  that  we  fol- 
lowed from  a  personal  point  of  view  in  the  last  chap- 
ter. Nor  is  it  possible  to  read  without  deep  response 
the  graphic  narrative.  Coming  from  the  country,  hor- 

43 


THE  DILEMMA 


rifled  by  the  pauperism  of  Moscow,  he  sets  himself  to 
the  work  of  relief  :  and  chronicles  for  us  the  sudden 
horrible  shame  he  experienced  when  he  had  yielded  to 
his  first  impulse  of  indiscriminate  almsgiving  :  — 

With  a  sense  of  having  committed  some  crime,  I  re- 
turned home.  There  I  entered  along  the  carpeted  steps  into 
the  rug-covered  hall,  and  having  taken  off  my  fur  coat  sat 
down  to  a  meal  of  five  courses.  ...  I  realized  not  only  with 
my  brain  but  with  every  pulse  of  my  soul,  that  while  there 
were  thousands  of  such  sufferers  in  Moscow,  I  ...  filled 
myself  daily  to  repletion  with  luxurious  dainties  of  every 
description. 

Whatever  the  wise  and  learned  of  the  earth  might  say 
about  it,  however  unalterable  the  course  of  life  might  ap- 
pear to  be,  the  same  evil  was  continually  being  enacted,  and 
I,  by  my  personal  habits  of  luxury,  was  a  promoter  of  that 
evil. 

I  might  have  given  away,  not  only  the  drink,  and  the 
small  sum  of  money  I  had  with  me,  but  also  the  coat  from 
off  my  shoulders  and  all  that  I  possessed  at  home.  I  had 
not  done  so,  and  therefore  felt  and  feel  and  can  never  cease 
to  feel  myself  a  partaker  in  a  crime  which  is  constantly 
being  committed,  so  long  as  I  have  superfluous  food  while 
others  have  none,  so  long  as  I  have  two  coats  while  there 
exists  one  man  without  any. 

From  this  familiar  starting-point  the  tale  goes  on : 
describing  with  grave  irony,  first  the  personal  minis- 
trations, then  the  effort,  more  or  less  successful,  to 
rouse  the  conscience  of  friends ;  the  organized  philan- 
thropy, and  the  startling  discovery  that  the  misery  of 
the  poor  went  back  to  causes  so  deep  that  "  their 

44 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


misfortunes  could  not  be  met  by  exterior  means,"  — 
that  "  in  order  to  help  them,  it  was  necessary  not  to  give 
them  food,  but  to  teach  them  how  to  eat."  Driven 
from  one  vantage-ground  to  another,  helpless  before 
the  problem  of  Rzanoffs',  the  tenement  house  which 
had  been  the  centre  of  his  efforts,  feeling  that  he  was 
"  like  a  man  trying  to  help  others  out  of  a  morass  who 
was  himself  stuck  fast  in  it,"  Tolstoy  is  driven  frankly 
to  face  the  situation  in  words  that  have  become  classic : 
"  It  is  as  if  I  were  sitting  on  the  neck  of  a  man,  and 
having  quite  crushed  him  down  I  compel  him  to  carry 
me,  and  assure  myself  and  others  that  I  am  very  sorry 
for  him,  and  wish  to  ease  his  condition  by  every  means 
in  my  power,  —  except  by  getting  off  his  back."  And 
again  :  "  The  theory  by  which  men  who  have  freed 
themselves  from  personal  labor  justify  themselves,  in 
its  simplest  form,  is  this  :  We  men,  having  freed  our- 
selves from  work,  and  having  by  violence  appropriated 
the  labor  of  others,  find  ourselves  in  consequence  bet- 
ter able  to  benefit  them."  But  "  If  I  wish  to  help  men, 
I  must  avoid  sharing  in  the  enslaving  of  men." 

And  the  means  not  to  share  in  the  enslaving  ?  The 
practical  conclusion  ?  —  Here,  where  Tolstoy  turns 
from  confession  to  reparation,  we  listened  breathless. 
Could  we  think  it  wise  to  follow  ?  And  if  we  surmised 
that  his  was  indeed  the  path  of  wisdom,  had  we  cour- 
age to  set  our  feet  therein  ? 

"  I  came  to  the  following  simple  conclusion  :  that  in 
order  to  avoid  causing  the  sufferings  and  depravity  of 
men,  I  ought  to  make  other  men  work  for  me  as  little 

45 


THE  DILEMMA 


as  possible,  and  to  work  myself  as  much  as  possible." 
The  dust  of  the  city  shaken  off ;  the  withdrawal  to 
country  life ;  the  dress,  the  food,  the  pursuits,  of 
peasants  ;  the  making  of  perishable  shoes  substituted 
for  the  making  of  immortal  books.  In  a  word,  the 
old  Platonic,  Ruskinian  doctrine  of  the  simplification 
of  wants  and  the  return  to  manual  labor.  The  union, 
as  we  have  already  said,  of  the  two  recipes  with  which 
we  are  familiar  :  life  to  be  moralized,  —  but  by  aban- 
doning it. 

It  is  an  alluring  path.  But  does  it  not  lead  out  into 
the  desert  ?  And  if  in  the  desert  peace  is  waiting,  what 
relation  has  that  peace  to  Rzanoffs',  left  behind? 

There  was  a  relation  in  Tolstoy's  mind.  His  healthy 
existence  in  the  quiet  of  the  fields  held  the  clue  as'lie 
believed  to  the  conquest  of  the  tenement-house  evils. 
Let  all  who  prey  upon  the  labor  of  others  —  the  privi- 
leged, the  leisure,  the  capital-owning  classes  —  follow 
his  example :  purify  their  lives,  refrain  from  luxury, 
and  share  in  physical  toil.  Two  results,-  he  believed, 
would  follow.  First,  the  crushing  labor  involved  in 
the  production  of  luxuries  would  be  eliminated  and 
a  large  amount  of  other  labor  would  be  lifted  from 
the  shoulders  of  the  poor;  next,  and  perhaps  even 
more  important,  among  those  self-subjected  to  this 
Spartan  discipline,  would  be  born  and  developed  by 
degrees  a  deep,  ingrained  distaste  for  the  possession 
of  any  property  at  all.  A  free  communism,  voluntary, 
Christian,  gentle,  to  be  reached  through  no  organ- 
ized movement  for  social  reconstruction,  but  as  an 

46 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


ultimate  result  from  the  moralizing  of  individual  con- 
duct, will  spread  among  all  right-minded  people ;  by 
holy  contagion,  men  will  become  more  and  more  right- 
minded  ;  and  the  end,  of  which  the  old  prophet  never 
despaired,  will  be  a  world  released  and  redeemed. 

No  thinking  person,  if  religiously  disposed,  can  dis- 
miss this  conception  lightly.  It  will  remain  to  the 
end  operative  in  the  inmost  fibres  of  his  social  be- 
ing. Again  and  again  we  shall  have  to  recur  to  it : 
for  there  is  some  reason  to  suspect  in  it  if  not  the  logi- 
cal culmination  of  the  social  seeking  of  the  century, 
at  least  the  most  complete  personal  answer  to  the  trou- 
ble of  the  social  conscience.  Yet  the  deep  sadness  that 
invaded  us  as  we  brooded  over  it  was  not  wholly  due 
to  personal  recoil  from  a  call  that  we  had  not  courage 
to  follow.  It  sprang  rather  from  our  thought  of  ulti- 
mate reactions,  and  the  wider  our  outlook  the  keener 
it  grew.  Tolstoy  does  not  shrink  from  the  repudiation 
of  art  and  science :  he  treats  modern  ideas  of  progress 
with  scorn:  the  life  of  the  peasant  is  to  him  the 
model  of  excellence,  and  his  honor  for  poverty  has  in 
mind  not  the  factory-worker,,  but  the  agricultural  la- 
borer alone.  But  over  the  suicide  of  civilization  most 
of  us  pause  hesitant.  The  Gospels  themselves  seem 
to  us  richer,  wider,  than  in  the  Tolstoyan  version. 
Despite  our  dissatisfactions  and  our  revulsions,  some 
reverence  for  the  world  as  it  is,  and  as  it  is  becoming, 
is  ingrained  within  us.  We  cannot  believe  that  to 
abandon  life  will  ever  avail  either  to  moralize  or  to 
save  it. 

47 


THE  DILEMMA 


Nor  could  we  feel  anything  new  in  the  solution.  To 
lure  as  many  elect  individuals  as  possible  out  of  the 
world  as  the  best  thing  that  can  be  done  for  them,  is 
a  method  at  least  as  old  as  the  days  of  St.  Benedict. 
It  was  in  its  time  a  great  and  effective  stroke  for  hu- 
man perfection  ;  but  that  time  is  over.  Twenty,  thirty 
years  ago,  while  still  within  the  horizon  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  we  felt  with  prescient  instinct  the  affili- 
ation which  the  sharp  approach  of  death  was  to  reveal. 
Tolstoy  fled  when  the  end  approached,  to  his  true  home. 
Nor  has  history  a  more  impressive  scene  in  its  private 
annals  than  the  picture  of  the  white-bearded  patriarch 
wise  with  all  modern  culture,  to  whom  wistful  pilgrims 
eager  for  a  social  gospel  had  for  long  years  journeyed 
from  East  and  West,  most  notably  from  the  United 
States,  at  last  forced  by  an  inward  stress  to  retire  as 
the  drama  of  his  life  drew  to  closing,  to  those  half- 
Oriental  monasteries  where,  conversing  with  his  recluse 
sister  or  with  ancient  sages  rapt  in  contemplative  calm, 
he  might  at  last  be  one  with  the  immemorial  tradition 
of  purity  in  abnegation,  and  find  his  solution  by  deny- 
ing the  will  to  live. 

IV 

Between  the  superb  arrogance  of  Nietzsche,  with 
his  clamor  for  fullness  of  life  regardless  of  the  fate 
of  the  weak,  and  this  new  anarchist  asceticism,  so  ten- 
der, so  difficult,  so  aimless,  we  might  then  choose  if  we 
would ;  and  the  choice  is  still  before  us.  What  do  we 
see  in  their  exponents  ?  On  the  one  hand  a  heart-rend- 

48 


OUR  WOULD-BE  GUIDES 


ing  figure,  dying  in  an  insane  asylum.  On  the  other, 
one  who  for  many  years  had  sought  consistency  in 
vain  and  had  been  driven  by  puzzled  affection  to  com- 
promise with  his  conscience ;  who  had  sought  to  attain 
a  fallacious  peace  by  imitating  the  more  external  fea- 
tures of  the  peasants'  life,  while  that  real  sting  of  pov- 
erty, the  terror  of  dependence  and  want,  remained 
unknown ;  who  sadly  endured  the  tender  ministries 
which,  as  Merejowski  contemptuously  records,  slipped 
sachets  of  his  favorite  perfume  surreptitiously  among 
his  linen  ;  who  wrote  no  more  Anna  Kareninas ;  and 
who  at  the  point  of  death  triumphantly  vindicated  his 
spiritual  honor  only  by  violating  the  ties  of  human 
devotion;  one  who  died  worsted  and  pitiful,  in  his 
effort  to  escape  the  burden  of  communal  guilt,  the 
most  significant,  most  appealing,  most  futile  figure  of 
this  strange  modern  world. 

Were  hidden  things  revealed,  the  honest  followers 
of  Nietzsche  would  probably  appear  more  numerous 
than  the  thorough  followers  of  Tolstoy.  But  both  are 
to  be  found.  Indeed,  one  would  not  deprecate  the  in- 
fluence or  value  of  any  phase  in  the  sincere  teaching 
at  which  we  have  all  too  briefly  glanced.  At  every 
point,  troubled  spirits  have  found  rest :  at  some  they 
have  found  healing  and  freedom.  Throngs  of  workers, 
philanthropists  and  reformers  are  still  laboring  val- 
iantly and  not  all  unf  ruitf  ully  to  moralize  the  present 
order :  an  occasional  rare  spirit,  steeped  it  may  be  in 
Emerson,  it  may  be  in  the  wisdom  of  the  East,  still 
flees  from  the  press  to  dwell  with  soothfastness.  And 

49 


THE  DILEMMA 


yet,  apart  from  these  fortunate  ones,  how  great  that 
throng  of  the  unsatisfied  among  whom  we  were  forced 
to  take  our  place  !  The  aristocratic  solution  is  impos- 
sible to  us,  simply  because  we  are  made  on  another 
pattern.  To  abandon  the  world  may  be  an  attractive 
proposition  ;  but  perhaps  we  exhausted  its  possibilities 
in  a  previous  incarnation.  In  one  way  or  another,  all 
individualistic  solutions,  not  least  that  of  Tolstoy,  ap- 
pear to  us  to  make  the  Great  Refusal,  which  is  the  re- 
fusal of  life  itself,  either  in  its  richest  aspect  of  sacrifice 
or  in  its  more  obvious  aspect  of  fulfillment.  As  for 
moralizing,  the  failure  of  our  attempts  to  make  any 
headway  on  that  line,  either  through  philanthropy  or 
reform,  was  precisely  what  had  driven  us  to  this  dis- 
heartening review. 

So  from  our  most  inspiring  leaders  came  tragic 
voices,  uttering  a  summons  that  few  indeed  would 
follow,  and  that  when  followed  led  to  no  country  of 
social  salvation,  but  to  solitary  and  erratic  paths,  where 
personal  satisfaction  might  perhaps  be  won,  but  where 
social  utility  in  the  broader  sense  was  wholly  dubious. 
The  further  we  proceeded,  the  more  did  the  application 
of  moral  idealism  to  the  social  problems  of  our  age 
appear  invested  with  unreality.  We  had  begun  this 
retrospect  because  we  were  at  a  standstill ;  we  ended 
it  with  no  consolation  except  such  as  came  from  per- 
ceiving that  the  wisest  and  most  vital  thinkers  of  the 
nineteenth  century  were  in  the  same  impasse  as  our- 
selves. 


CHAPTER  III 

A   PROMISE   OF   LIGHT 


AT  this  juncture,  help  was  waiting ;  it  had  been 
waiting  all  the  time.  We  raised  our  eyes  from  the 
brilliant  pages  of  the  theorists,  we  turned  them  to  the 
field  of  life.  There  we  saw  a  force  at  work,  alien  in 
some  ways  to  all  other  ideals  of  social  redemption  ; 
curiously  unnoted  in  most  educated  circles,  yet  active 
through  all  the  century:  appearing,  vanishing,  pre- 
senting itself  repeatedly  in  a  new  guise,  and  shaping 
formula  progressively  enriched  and  clarified. 

This  force  differed  from  all  those  just  passed  in 
review,  in  that  it  sought  neither  to  moralize  nor  to 
abandon  but  to  transform  our  existing  civilization. 
It  rested  in  no  barren  defiance,  it  was  indifferent 
to  schemes  of  personal  escape,  it  had  slight  interest 
in  the  application  of  palliatives  and  panaceas.  It 
presented  for  consideration  a  synthetic  conception 
of  past  human  progress,  it  looked  with  prescient  au- 
thority into  far  reaches  of  the  social  future,  and  it 
outlined  constructive  principles  that  would  lead  to 
action  on  a  vast  scale,  to  be  carried  out,  not  through 
the  multiplication  of  isolated  efforts,  but  through  the 
coordination  of  the  collective  will. 

This  force  was  Socialism.  A  surprising  recognition 
51 


THE  DILEMMA 


grew  on  us  of  its  persistence,  its  adaptability,  its 
intimate  relation  to  the  changing  order.  The  various 
gospels  of  our  nineteenth-century  writers  would  have 
been  as  possible  in  any  other  age  as  in  our  own.  For 
instance,  the  Pagan  attitude  of  Nietzsche  merely 
touched  with  self-consciousness  the  ideals  implicit  in 
every  Hellenic  renascence,  — Leon  Alberti  in  the  six- 
teenth century  being  as  good  a  superman  as  our  age 
is  likely  to  produce.  No  guiding  word  which  might 
not  have  been  spoken  in  the  thirteenth  century  came 
from  those  true  heirs  of  medieval  Christianity,  Rus- 
kin  and  Tolstoy.  But  the  language  of  these  new 
thinkers,  true  or  false,  fell  fresh  on  our  ears.  They 
had  learned  it,  not  before  the  throne  of  an  abstract 
Justice  enskied  in  distant  heavens,  but  close  to  the 
great  earth-murmur  that  rises  confusedly  from  the  act- 
ual life  of  men.  Their  gospel  was  a  modern  product ; 
and  in  its  modernity  and  actuality,  we  who  had  found 
general  moral  truths,  unrelated  to  temporal  phenomena, 
alluringly  easy  to  formulate  and  distressingly  hard  to 
apply,  felt  the  first  strength  of  the  socialist  appeal. 

II 

We  set  ourselves  to  review  the  history  of  socialism  ; 
and  looking  back,  we  noted  a  long  preparation.  We 
saw  the  eighteenth  century,  stagnant  on  the  surface, 
a -quiver  beneath  with  new  life  engendered  by  the 
union  of  the  emotional  revolt  initiated  by  Rousseau, 
with  the  critical  philosophy  of  France  and  what  has 
been  called  the  rediscovery  of  the  inner  life  in  Ger- 

52 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


many.  This  in  the  sphere  of  ideas.  Meantime,  in  the 
outer  world,  the  Industrial  Revolution  is  accomplished : 
machines,  supplanting  hand-labor,  fall  into  the  hands 
of  the  fortunate,  the  few,  the  strong ;  and  the  modern 
proletariat,  the  modern  bourgeoisie,  are  marshaled  be- 
fore us. 

This  secret  process,  soon  to  generate  its  Apologia 
in  the  Manchester  School,  goes  on  all  but  unnoted ; 
and  presently  the  whirlwind  of  the  political  revolu- 
tion sweeps  over  Europe.  Thrones  fall,  political  demo- 
cracy is  born.  In  the  earlier  stages  at  least  of  the 
Revolution,  middle  and  working  classes  are  united 
in  attack  on  the  aristocrat,  their  common  enemy,  — 
though  Kropotkin's  brilliant  history  of  the  epoch  en- 
ables one  to  distinguish  the  roles.  As  the  nineteenth 
century  goes  on,  cleavage  gaps  plain,  though  for  a 
time  unnoted.  The  Napoleonic  storm  changes  the  map 
of  Europe,  and  a  chaotic  society  experiences  a  dis- 
comfort and  bewilderment  in  which  the  restless  ego- 
tism of  youth  mistakes  itself  for  the  exhaustion  of  age. 
uDon  Juan  "  and  "Vanity  Fair"  are  excellent  social 
documents  to  picture  the  period.  Passing  on,  we  find 
a  monarchical  and  aristocratic  reaction  on  the  Con- 
tinent; but  it  hardly  affects  the  swift  rise  of  Lib- 
eralism to  power.  Child  of  the  dominant  forces  in 
both  industrial  and  political  revolution,  this  liberalism 
masks  itself  as  the  champion  of  freedom,  and  the 
period  of  its  triumph  is  rightly  described  by  Marx  as 
"  the  most  infamous  and  reactionary  epoch  in  English 
history."  Culminating  in  the  Reform  Bill  of  1832,  it 

53 


THE  DILEMMA 


controls  the  day  in  politics,  industry,  and  religion. 
This  is  the  period  of  the  worst  exploitation  of  labor, 
coupled  with  such  complacent  self-satisfaction  in  ma- 
terial advance  as  expresses  itself  in  letters  through 
Lord  Macaulay. 

The  conservative  parties,  opposed  to  the  riot  of  in- 
dividualism, coquet  more  or  less  feebly  with  the  deeper 
instincts  of  the  inchoate  social  democracy,  as  may  still 
be  seen  in  those  curious  books  "Sybil"  and  "  Con- 
ingsby,"  and  in  the  dazzling  career  of  their  author.  Yet 
on  the  whole  aristocratic  ideas  are  fading,  and  by  the 
midale  of  the  century  it  has  become  evident  to  some 
people  of  insight  that  the  significant  struggle  of  the 
future  is  not  to  be  between  the  survivors  of  feudalism 
and  the  middle  class,  but  between  this  domineering 
class,  cArying  with  it  so  lusty  and  forceful  a  concep- 
tion of  solLal  relations,  and  the  confused  powers  of  the 
land-less,  ™pital-less  man,  without  whose  strength  both 
land  and  capital  are  helpless. 

It  is  in  the  social  ferment  of  1848  that  the  new 
opposition  becomes  clear.  France  experiences,  though 
only  for  a  moment,  a  true  proletarian  revolution,  and 
under^  Louis  Blanc  actually  attempts  to  extend  demo- 
cracy beyond  political  to  industrial  relations.  Germany, 
Italy,  feel  more  faintly  the  same  stir,  and  the  brave, 
brief  experiment  of  Mazzini  at  Rome  focuses  the  gaze 
of  Europe.  In  England,  the  failure  of  Chartism,  the 
first  agitation  distinctively  proletarian  in  character,  is 
accompanied  by  a  growing  protest  against  liberalism 
as  the  sum  of  wisdom,  and  competition  as  the  safe- 

54 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


guard  of  freedom.  KiDgsley  and  Maurice  grope  their 
way  in  the  dark ;  yet  such  a  book  as  "  Alton  Locke," 
such  effort  as  that  of  the  Christian  Socialists,  blunder- 
ing and  bourgeois  as  they  now  appear,  mark  the  advent 
of  a  new  conviction  that  society  has  got  to  be  saved  by 
other  means  than  reform  or  philanthropy,  that  the  in- 
dustrial system  as  a  whole  obviously  cannot  be  mor- 
alized by  changes  in  detail,  but  must  be  transformed 
in  its  foundations.  In  Mrs.  Browning's  "Aurora 
Leigh,"  that  neglected  potpourri  of  ancient  fragrances, 
one  may  still  breathe  with  delightful  fullness  the  social 
aspirations  of  the  time. 

Precisely  at  this  point  appears  a  modest  document 
called  the  "  Communist  Manifesto."  Nobody  in  Eng- 
land pays  any  attention  to  it ;  it  does  not  rise  into  the 
air  of  polite  letters,  and  one  finds  no  evidence  that  the 
public  which  was  delighting  in  Ruskin's  early  art-books 
and  protesting  against  the  social  diatribes  of  Carlyle 
had  ever  heard  of  it. ,  Nevertheless  it  was  there :  writ- 
ten in  German,  published  from  London,  apparently 
doomed  to  oblivion  for  a  time  by  the  defeat  of  the 
Revolution  in  France,  but  through  "  The  International " 
making  its  way  by  degrees  into  every  European  lan- 
guage and  country,  till  by  1888  Friedrich  Engels  couH 
call  it "  the  common  platform  acknowledged  by  millions 
of  workingmen  from  Siberia  to  California."  If  our  pil- 
grim came  across  it  at  the  end  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, it  probably  gave  him  a  curious  shock.  Reading 
it  to-day,  we  find  it  full  of  the  exact  ideas,  some  of  them 
crudely  enough  put,  with  which  the  twentieth  century 

55 


THE  DILEMMA 


is  busy.  Its  appearance  signals  the  advent  of  social- 
ism in  the  modern  sense  as  a  force  to  reckon  with. 

There  had  been  hints  enough  of  socialism  earlier. 
It  had  glanced  forth,  only  to  be  suppressed,  in  certain 
audacious  and  obscure  phases  of  speculation  in  1793, 
regarded  with  sincere  horror  by  those  bourgeois  radi- 
cals who  would  fain  have  been  considered  the  only 
friends  of  freedom.  It  had  woven  a  fair  tissue  of  doc- 
trinaire fantasies  in  the  earlier  "  Utopists,"  and  had 
developed  more  practical  and  prophetic  theory  and 
experiment  in  the  work  of  Robert  Owen.  But  only  in 
the  middle  of  the  century,  after  a  conservative  reaction 
had  worn  out  its  strength,  after  middle-class  liberalism 
had  reached  its  flaunting  zenith,  do  we  find  its  theo- 
ries assuming  a  modern  character :  — 

The  bourgeoisie  is  unfit  any  longer  to  be  the  ruling  class 
in  society,  and  to  impose  its  conditions  of  existence  on  so- 
ciety as  an  over-riding  law.  It  is  unfit  to  rule  because  it  is 
incompetent  to  assure  an  existence  to  its  slave  within  his 
slavery,  because  it  cannot  help  letting  him  sink  into  such  a 
state  that  it  has  to  feed  him  instead  of  being  fed  by  him. 
Society  can  no  longer  live  under  this  bourgeoisie,  in  other 
words  its  existence  is  no  longer  compatible  with  society. 

The  essential  condition  for  the  existence  and  for  the  sway 
of  the  bourgeois  class  is  the  formation  and  augmentation 
of  capital ;  the  condition  for  capital  is  wage-labor.  Wage 
labor  rests  exclusively  on  competition  between  the  laborers. 
The  advance  of  industry,  whose  involuntary  promoter  is 
the  bourgeoisie,  replaces  the  isolation  of  the  laborers,  due 
to  competition,  by  their  revolutionary  combination,  due  to 
association.  The  development  of  Modern  Industry,  there- 

56 


A  PKOMISE  OF  LIGHT 


fore,  cuts  from  under  its  feet  the  very  foundations  on  which 
the  bourgeoisie  produces  and  appropriates  products.  What 
the  bourgeoisie  therefore  produces  above  all  are  its  own 
grave-diggers.  Its  fall  and  the  victory  of  the  proletariat  are 
equally  inevitable. 

Such  are  the  ideas  which  in  the  "  Communist  Mani- 
festo "  emerge  into  the  daylight,  and  which  from  that 
day  to  our  own  are  never  to  be  wholly  obscured  again. 

Ill 

As  we  feel  the  modern  quality  in  the  stinging  sen- 
tences, we  may  well  marvel  at  the  unconsciousness  of 
the  age  into  which  they  crept.  Yet,  to  continue  our  re- 
view into  the  second  half  of  the  century,  in  England  we 
have  again  to  chronicle  reaction.  "  The  shouting  and 
the  tumult  dies  " ;  the  agitation  for  social  reform  fades 
and  recedes.  On  one  point,  indeed,  the  prophecy  of 
Marx  finds  swift  fulfillment.  The  "  isolation  of  the 
laborers,  due  to  competition,"  is  quietly  supplemented 
by  their  "  combination,"  and  the  class-conscious  trade- 
union  movement,  heir  of  Chartism,  precursor  of  labor 
in  politics,  develops  with  Anglo  -  Saxon  persistence, 
displaying  its  power  to  protect  the  interests  of  the 
workers,  while  at  the  same  time  it  trains  them  in  soli- 
darity. But  the  trade-union,  true  to  its  English  blood, 
deals  at  first  little  in  theories.  It  is  for  deeds,  not  for 
speculation  or  speech.  So  far  as  current  thought  and 
letters  go,  interest  in  social  questions  flags  after  the 
Forty-eight  for  twenty  years  or  more. 

In  the  sixties,  comes  an  intellectual  revolution. 
57 


THE  DILEMMA 


Under  the  influence  of  science,  men's  attitude  toward 
the  natural  universe  undergoes  a  fundamental  change. 
Evolution  was  in  the  air  before  this  decade.  Brown- 
ing in  the  thirties,  Tennyson  at  the  exact  turn  of  the 
century  in  1850,  had  expressed  the  idea  with  a  vivid- 
ness and  precision  such  as  only  poets  command.  But 
not  till  now,  after  the  publication  of  the  epoch-making 
book  of  Darwin,  did  the  conception  fill  the  public  mind ; 
and  a  glance  at  the  table  of  contents  of  the  great 
reviews  during  the  decade  shows  easily  how  it  drove 
all  other  interests  into  the  background. 

Meantime,  social  radicalism  was  in  special  disrepute. 
For  had  not  The  International  been  formed,  after  the 
great  world  -  exposition  in  the  Crystal  Palace?  And 
did  not  the  mere  report  of  this  association  in  the  Un- 
derworld—  a  red  spectre,  a  phantasmal  horror  — 
fill  educated  and  privileged  minds  with  shocked  dis- 
tress, and  check  dispassionate  thinking?  With  scant 
surprise,  people  hailed  in  the  Parisian  Commune  of 
1870  the  natural  and  disastrous  outcome  of  a  move- 
ment which  they  had  ludicrously  misconceived,  and 
which  had  filled  them  with  as  much  dismay  as  if  echo- 
ing rumors  from  a  conclave  in  Pandaemonium  had 
penetrated  the  decorous  circles  that  gathered  around 
Queen  Victoria. 

None  the  less,  and  largely  through  the  internal 
struggles  of  this  very  International,  radicalism  had 
been  gradually  disentangling  itself  from  its  old  revo- 
lutionary traditions  of  violence  and  intrigue,  and 
emerging  into  another  phase.  The  dark  method  of 

58 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


conspiracy  and  secrecy  —  charged  with  a  romantic 
tone  thoroughly  in  keeping  with  the  tastes  of  mid- 
nineteenth-century  Jiterature  and  art  —  were  to  be 
known  less  a,nd  less.  Indeed,  they  were  before  long  to 
be  driven  for  refuge  to  that  half-feudal  Russia  where 
they  still  flourish.  Socialism  too  was  learning  its  lesson 
from  evolution,  and  Karl  Marx  the  revolutionist  was 
its  teacher.  Marx's  great  work,  "Das  Capital/'  tne 
first  volume  of  which  appeared  scarcely  five  years  after 
the  "  Origin  of  Species,"  fulfilled  the  most  original 
promise  of  his  "Communist  Manifesto";  for  it  set 
out  to  interpret  economic  theory  strictly  in  the  light 
of  historic  development.  Current  social  ideals,  even  so 
late  as  the  mid-nineteenth  century,  had  gazed  upward 
for  guidance  into  the  open  sky  of  Platonic  eternity ; 
the  Manchester  School  pursued  its  cheerful  observa- 
tions within  the  limited  horizons  of  a  supposedly  perma- 
nent present.  It  was  left  for  the  scientific  socialism 
founded  by  Marx  to  lure  the  eye  to  further  adventures 
and  bid  it  choose  its  path  toward  a  true  human  future 
through  exploration  of  the  actual  past. 

Not  till  ten  years  and  more  after  the  collapse  of  the 
Commune  and  the  consequent  reaction,-  did  the  full 
force  of  the  new  method  of  attack  begin-  to  be  grad- 
ually realized.  Many  causes,  among  which  must  be 
counted  the  inveterate  Hebraism  of  the  English,  ac- 
count for  the  extraordinary  slowness  with  which  Eng- 
land awoke  to  the  import  of  the  new  alliance  between 
evolutionary  science  and  sociology.  By  the  eighties, 
however,  preliminaries  were  over.  Democracy,  which 

59 


THE  DILEMMA 


all  through  the  century  had  been  either  repudiated 
or  distrusted  by  the  wisest  idealists,  had  finally  won, 
at  least  as  an  experiment,  the  right  of  way.  And  not 
only  individuals,  but  groups  of  men,  arose  to  assert 
that  the  union  of  evolutionary  and  democratic  ideals 
spelled  socialism. 

This  salient  decade  of  the  eighties,  in  which  our 
imaginary  pilgrim  is  still  stationed,  witnessed  then  at 
last  the  rise  in  England  of  a  genuine  socialist  move- 
ment. Many  English  students  might  repudiate  Marx. 
None  the  less,  they  profited  by  his  unrelenting  demand 
for  the  substitution  of  economic  analysis  for  ethical 
vfantasy.  Through  the  valiant  work  of  the  Fabians,  of 
William  Morris  and  the  Social  Democratic  Federation, 
and  of  the  Independent  Labor  Party  a  little  later, 
socialism  before  the  end  of  the  century  was  out  in  the 
open  and  not  to  be  ignored.  During  this  decade, 
though  it  held  even  in  England  a  larger  proportion  than 
to-day  of  violent  and  anarchical  elements,  it  already 
tended  to  justify  the  prediction  of  Marx,  that  in  this 
one  country  it  might  be  able  to  prevail  without  revolu- 
tion. None  the  less  startling  was  its  message.  It  rose,  a 
vast  Presence,  extending  arms  of  invitation  ;  appearing 
to  some  shadowy  and  baleful,  to  others  illumined  with 
the  light  of  a  yet  unrisen  sun.  So  it  still  stands  to-day : 
less  and  less  shadowy,  more  and  more  compelling. 

IV 

Our  idealists  would  have  none  of  it.  They  thought 
it  "dangerous,"  they  thought  it  "materialistic,"  or 

60 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


they  never  thought  of  it  at  all.  Yet  no  small  factor  in 
the  relief  with  which  many  a  mind  toward  the  end  of 
the  century  welcomed  the  socialist  ideal,  was  the  per- 
ception that  the  instincts  at  play  in  piteous  confusion 
among  the  idealists  found  satisfaction  and  coherence 
in  the  socialist  synthesis. 

This  synthesis  presented,  to  begin  with,  an  indict- 
ment in  no  wise  unfamiliar,  save  as  it  gathered  together 
and  related  to  a  centre  the  vivid  impressions  of  the 
imaginative  writers.  Here  was  the  same  revulsion  from 
a  society  sordid  and  soiled  as  that  which  inspired  Haupt- 
mann's  "  Weavers  "  or  Zola's  "  Germinal," — here  the 
same  force  of  veiled  and  baffled  pity.  The  socialist 
movement,  like  the  literature  of  the  age,  included  men 
impelled  by  personal  revolt  and  others  inspired  by 
chivalric  and  disinterested  rage.  On  the  positive  side, 
the  points  of  contact  were  even  more  suggestive,  till  it 
was  hard  not  to  feel  that  the  diverse  groping  and  baffled 
instincts  of  our  leaders  would  have  found  their  home 
in  this  synthesis,  and  there  alone.  Had  not  the  desire  \ 
to  moralize  society  led  even  Ruskin  to  a  faint  vis- 
ion of  a  cooperative  order,  albeit  an  afterglow  from 
the  set  sun  of  feudalism  illumined  the  country  of  his 
dreams?  What  socialist  could  demand  a  more  drastic 
statement  than  his  bold  words,  "  All  social  evils  arise 
from  the  pillage  of  the  laborer  by  the  idler "  ?  Did 
not  Mazzini,  in  some  ways  greatest  among  the  modern 
prophets,  place  an  almost  mystic  stress  on  the  future 
of  "  Association  "  ?  "  True  liberty,"  said  he,  "  cannot 
exist  without  equality,  and  equality  can  only  exist 

61 


THE    DILEMMA 


among  those  who  start  from  a  common  ground." 
Strange  to  say,  Matthew  Arnold,  a  thinker  all  but  si- 
lent concerning  social  misery,  preoccupied  rather  with 
the  intellectual  defects  of  our  civilization,  had  spoken 
in  the  same  sense :  "  Our  inequality,"  said  he,  in  the 
memorable  phrase  that  smacks  of  purest  socialism, 
"  Our  inequality  materializes  our  upper  class,  vulgar- 
izes our  middle  class,  brutalizes  our  lower  class."  The 
i  socialist  program  could  be  summed  up  as  the  reduc- 
'  tion  of  economic  inequality,  —  and  if  we  remembered 
in  addition  Arnold's  constant  stress  on  the  need  for 
extension  of  the  functions  of  the  State,  what  prevented 
our  hailing  him  as  comrade  ?  The  grim  old  sage  of 
Chelsea  had  cried  in  distress,  as  he  faced  the  individ- 
ualistic Victorian  chaos :  "  How  in  connection  with 
inevitable  democracy,  indispensable  sovereignty  is  to 
exist, — it  is  the  question  of  questions!"  Socialism 
alone  had  an  answer  to  that  question  in  its  conception 
of  a  social  democracy,  no  longer  chaotic,  but  organized. 
As  for  Tolstoy,  withheld  as  he  was  from  socialism  by  his 
distaste  for  that  direct  external  compulsion  to  labor 
which  a  socialist  state  would  involve,  his  emphasis  on 
the  universal  duty  of  manual  toil  was  yet  quite  in  the 
socialist  vein,  and  that  communistic  society  which  he 
foresaw  as  the  far  goal  of  voluntary  sacrifice,  singu- 
larly resembled  the  civilization  predicted  by  many  a 
socialist  as  the  final  outcome,  to  be  reached  on  strict 
lines  of  necessary  economic  evolution,  beyond  an  in- 
termediate stage.  Nor  would  Marx  himself  have  dis- 
avowed the  brave  words:  "Property  is  the  root  of 

G2 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


all  evil,  and  at  the  same  time  property  is  that  toward 
which  all  the  activity  of  modern  society  is  directed,  and 
that  which  controls  the  activity  of  the  world." 


These  words  of  Tolstoy  might  well  serve  as  text  to 
the  new  faith.  For  the  attitude  toward  property  is  the 
dividing  point  between  the  socialist  schools  and  aD 
philanthropy  and  reform.  This  point  had  been  hinted 
by  almost  every  constructive  thinker  of  the  nineteenth 
century ;  but  the  world  had  not  caught  it,  nor  can  we 
be  surprised,  for  half  the  time  these  thinkers  had 
not  caught  it  themselves.  Socialism  however  never 
blurred  nor  missed  it.  Now  noisily,  now  with  dogged 
quiet,  it  reasserted  the  conviction  that  only  by  limit- 
ing the  right  to  private  wealth  could  our  social  wrongs 
be  cured.  It  would  hear  no  talk  of  moralizing  a  social 
structure  that  it  held  to  be  immoral  ingrain  :  in  aban- 
doning the  common  lot,  it  felt  no  interest.  Swiftly  or 
slowly,  a  radically  new  social  order  must  be  achieved. 
And  the  one  necessary  factor  in  its  achievement  was 
the  denial  of  the  individual's  inalienable  right  to  pri- 
vate property,  and  the  substitution  of  social  for  private 
ownership  in  the  case  of  at  least  the  greater  portion  of 
wealth  socially  produced. 

Now  this  was  a/conception,  in  the  immortal  words  of 
Dogberry,  most  tolerable*  and  not  to  be  endured.  All 
liberties  may  be  taken  with  an  Angora  cat  so  long  as 
her  sacred  tail  is  not  disturbed  :  touch  that,  and  spit- 
ting and  scratches  are  your  portion.  In  like  manner, 

63 


THE  DILEMMA 


the  principle  of  private  property  may  not  be  handled, 
however  gently ;  it  is  sacrosanct,  surrounded  by  mys- 
tic awe,  connected  in  some  undefined  manner  with  the 
proprieties  of  marriage  and  the  ardors  of  religion. 
Socialism  all  through  the  nineties  was  of  course  affect- 
ing far  more  people  than  accepted  it.  Its  doctrines 
were  coloring  the  ideas  even  of  its  opponents  and  aid- 
ing immensely  in  the  process  already  described,  by 
which  philanthropy  itself  underwent  a  democratic  trans- 
formation. None  the  less  alien  was  its  essential  point. 
However  far  the  reform  movement  might  sympathize 
with  the  aims  of  socialism  and  even  accept  its  immedi- 
ate measures,  this  heart  and  centre  of  socialist  faith, 
this  conviction  that  our  social  and  economic  evils  can 
never  be  ended  till  land  and  capital  be  socially  owned, 
remained  anathema. 

Indeed,  for  a  long  time  the  most  fiery  radicalism 
had  refrained  quite  as  much  as  conservative  orthodoxy 
from  attacking  the  principle  of  property.  In  the  dra- 
matic days  of  that  bourgeois  revolution  at  the  end  of 
the  eighteenth  century  which  introduced  the  modern 
world,  and  unconsciously  instituted  a  new  tyranny 
where  it  sought  to  destroy  the  old,  the  leaders  who 
sang  the  Marseillaise  with  most  energy  protested  their 
vociferous  loyalty  to  the  holy  and  unlimited  right  of 
men  to  personal  possessions.  Kropotkin's  history  of  the 
epoch  enables  us  to  follow  the  shocked  correctness 
with  which  messieurs  les  revolutionnaires  protest  their 
religious  adherence  to  the  principle.  The  National 
Assembly,  when  soon  after  the  taking  of  the  Bastille 

64 


A  PKOMISE  OF  LIGHT 


it  drew  up  its  famous  Declaration  of  Rights,  followed 
its  model,  the  American  Declaration  of  Independence, 
in  omitting  all  reference  to  the  economic  relations  of 
citizens,  except  that  it  affirmed  property  to  be  "  invio- 
lable and  sacred."  The  Girondists  inscribed  the  words 
"  Liberty  "  and  "  Property  "  on  the  base  of  their  stat- 
ues. The  Constitution  of  1793  in  its  second  article 
defined  the  rights  of  man  as  "  Equality,  Liberty,  Se- 
curity, and  Property,"  and  it  was  no  less  a  man  than 
Danton  who  said  at  tlfe  first  sitting  of  the  Convention, 
"  Let  us  declare  that  all  properties,  territorial,  individ- 
ual and  industrial,  shall  be  forever  respected."  Com- 
munistic theories,  inevitably  born  of  the  stirring  times, 
countenanced  by  the  Montagnards  and  yet  more  vig- 
orously by  the  Enrages,  were  sternly  frowned  down^ 
The  Revolution  accomplished  the  end  which  the  lead- 
ers had  from  the  very  first  more  or  less  clearly  pro- 
posed to  themselves :  upon  the  ruins  of  feudalism,  it 
laid  the  foundations  for  government  by  those  middle 
classes  then  rapidly  growing  through  the  development 
of  trade  and  commerce,  and  dependent  on  free  access 
to  wealth  and  secure  possession  of  it.  This  government 
naturally  rested  on  respect  for  private  property  as  its 
very  base. 

The  liberalism  in  economics  and  politics  which  was 
the  immediate  outcome  of  the  Revolution,  and  the 
concomitant  of  middle-class  rule,  consequently  invested 
Property  with  a  religious  awe  greater  far  than  that 
with  which  it  was  regarded  in  the  Middle  Ages.  Plenty 
of  moral  talk  was  current  on  the  matter  :  it  grew  clearer, 

65 


THE  DILEMMA 


shriller,  year  by  year,  especially  as  the  under-world  be- 
gan to  grow  a  little  deaf.  It  continues  to  our  own  day, 
with  increasing  emphasis  and  earnestness.  Property 
is  a  sacred  trust ;  it  is  to  be  administered  —  after  our 
own  comfort  is  assured  —  for  the  advantage  of  our 
brethren.  The  word  "ethics"  —  and  this  is  surely 
a  gain  —  is  quite  habitually  mentioned  in  connection 
with  it ;  books  are  even  published  that  bring  the  two 
words  together  in  the  title. 

The  suggestions  that  result  are  troubling  to  the 
fierce  passion  of  acquisitiveness  which  modern  life  has 
let  loose,  and  however  vehemently  they  are  scouted, 
they  prove  hard  to  forget.  It  has  never  been  really 
denied  that  men  have  a  moral  responsibility  toward 
the  distribution  of  their  wealth  ;  even  within  the  nine- 
teenth century,  the  theory  emerged  which  the  twenti- 
eth seems  inclined  to  emphasize,  that  they  have  also 
responsibility  toward  their  methods  of  making  it.  This 
is  a  notion  as  alien  to  the  psychology  of  the  modern 
financier  as  it  would  have  been  to  Robin  Hood ;  but 
on  the  whole,  its  exponents  and  champions  are  ap- 
plauded by  the  public.  Blatant  graft,  cruelty  in  the  com- 
petitive game,  are  grist  to  the  mill  of  popular  magazines.; 
Even  luxury  of  the  more  extreme  type  is  condemned, 
—  particularly  by  those  who  cannot  command  it.  A 
fairly  definite  ideal  floats  before  the  general  mind.  It 
includes  justice  in  gain,  moderation  in  use,  generosity 
in  expenditure.  This  ideal  is  obviously  safe,  attract- 
ive and  desirable,  and  though  current  practice  is  wr 
enough  from  conforming  to  it,  it  receives  the  lip  hoin- 

66 

* 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


age  of  all.  But  we  go  no  further.  Hint  for  one  mo- 
ment that  civilization  must  be  altered  from  the  roots, 
—  touch  at  any  point  that  nervous  system  of  society, 
the  rights  of  private  property,  —  then  the  galled  jade 
winces,  and  complacency  is  at  an  end. 

Nevertheless,  the  thought  of  the  proscribed  and  ob- 
scure has  ended  by  coming  out  into  the  light  of  day. 
Preached  from  Plato  on  by  an  occasional  fanatic, 
working  as  it  were  underground  and  in  silence  through 
successive  epochs,  emerging  from  time  to  time  with 
new  emphasis  and  fortified  with  new  relations,  it  is  at 
last  before  the  eyes  of  all  thinking  men.  It  has  en- 
tered practical  politics :  it  compels  general  attention 
and  rouses  widespread  challenge.  People  may  loathe 
it.  They  may  repudiate  and  refute  it.  They  cannot 
ignore  it.  The  principle  that  private  property  is  a 
sacred,  primary  and  inalienable  right  is  no  longer  an 
assumption  to  build  on :  it  is  a  thesis  to  be  proved. 

VI 

The  establishment  of  socialism  in  a  conspicuous 
position  before  the  seeking  mind  of  the  age,  was  then 
the  most  important  intellectual  event  of  the  past 
quarter-century.  Those  who  accepted  the  new  gospel 
in  the  early  days  left  their  own  people  and  their 
father's  house,  and  their  nearest  were  likely  to  turn 
against  them.  The  searching  quality  of  the  new  force 
was  indicated  by  the  antagonism  it  roused.  One 
might  labor  forever  to  moralize  the  situation,  and 
meet  with  sentimental  applause.  One  might  defy 

67 


THE  DILEMMA 


civilization  if  one  liked,  —  go  barefoot,  turn  vegetarian, 
or  even  fling  away  from  marriage  and  the  Church,  — 
nobody  took  very  seriously  a  policy  which  left  the 
social  machine  to  creak  along  as  usual,  only  persuad- 
ing the  believer  to  get  out  of  its  way.  But  socialism 
was  a  different  matter:  here  a  large  proportion  of 
those  whose  mental  and  material  life  flourished  under 
things  as  they  are  scented  the  arch-enemy.  And 
people  who  ranged  themselves  on  its  side,  had  at  last 
the  coveted  satisfaction  of  standing  in  notorious  op- 
position to  the  system  they  most  abhorred.  It  had 
patronized  them  and  even  given  them  funds,  when 
they  founded  settlements  and  served  on  charity-boards  ; 
it  had  applauded  them  when  they  made  personal  sacri- 
fices, and  viewed  them  with  nothing  worse  than  mild 
disapproval  when  they  tried  to  remedy  some  crass 
superficial  results  of  the  competitive  system.  But  let 
them  repudiate  that  system  as  a  whole  and  summon 
men  to  renounce  the  greed  for  private  gain  which  was 
at  the  root  of  it,  and  straightway  they  could  enter 
a  claim  to  the  Beatitude  promised  the  persecuted. 
They  knew  such  exaltation  as  St.  Francis  must  have 
known,  when  he  threw  his  garments  in  the  face  of 
his  astonished  father,  and  faced  in  triumphant  naked- 
ness a  World  in  Clothes. 

For  how  beyond  measure  were  the  compensations  ! 

itv  Socialism  quieted  that  ache  of  the  heart  which  had 

never  before  found  comfort.    By  bitter  experience  we 

had  learned  that  the  destruction  of  the  poor  is  their 

poverty,  and  that  handicaps  increased  automatically 

68 


A  PROMISE  OF  LIGHT 


from  one  generation  to  another,  till  whole  classes  were 
bound  hand  and  foot.  Now,  —  rightly  or  wrongly  this 
is  not  the  place  to  consider,  —  we  were  shown  a  fu- 
ture in  which  by  adjustments  equally  unconscious,  all 
children  should  start  free  from  automatic  disabilities 
in  a  fair  and  open  field.  Not  Plato  nor  More  nor  any 
other  Utopian  had  sketched  in  Cloud-Cuckoo  Land 
a  more  sensible  world  than  that  which  the  socialist 
soberly  believed  to  be  on  the  way. 

And  the  wonderful  thing  was,  that  it  was  the 
theory  habitually  dismissed  as  most  fantastic,  which 
now  assured  us  that  the  hope  of  escape  from  "  the 
exploitation  of  the  worker  by  the  idler  "  was  born  of 
no  sentimental  revolt,  but  of  the  sternest  interpre- 
tation of  history.  Times  and  seasons  no  one  knew. 
The  process  might  be  slow  or  swift,  —  on  this  point, 
as  on  many  others,  we  saw  at  once  that  socialists 
differed  among  themselves.  What  matter  ?  We  were 
told  to  believe  that  the  hour  was  striking,  and  that 
the  whole  civilization  we  hated,  with  its  ugly  extremes 
of  greed  and  want,  its  emphasis  not  even  on  physi- 
cal force  but  on  mere  pelf,  as  a  measure  of  value,  its 
tempting  incentives  to  cruelty  masked  as  enterprise 
and  mean  -  spiritedness  masked  as  resignation,  was 
doomed.  After  the  cutting  disappointment  inflicted 
by  the  feebleness  of  philanthropy  and  the  failure 
of  reform,  after  our  saddened  revolt  from  the  per- 
sonal solution  pressed  on  us  by  religion,  after  our 
discovery  that  the  guides  we  most  trustee!  were  lost  in 
the  same  maze  with  ourselves,  came  socialism  like  a 


THE  DILEMMA 


new  evangel:  and  we  felt  such  relief  as  a  trapped 
creature  may  feel,  when  a  sudden  movement  sets  his 
foot  free  from  the  spring,  and  the  world  awaits  his 
choosing. 


CHAPTER  IV 

"  THE  TUG  *S   TO   COME  " 


"  ALL  to  the  very  end  is  trial  in  life."  We  have 
conducted  our  pilgrim  simultaneously  to  socialism  and 
to  the  end  of  the  last  century.  But  the  doom  of  the 
quest  is  on  him  still,  and  his  further  adventures  are 
those  which  chiefly  concern  us.  For  this  book  is  not 
written  to  review  a  past  experience,  but,  against  the 
background  now  lightly  sketched,  to  study  a  present 
situation. 

The  joy  the  convert  to  socialism  knew  held  many 
factors.  There  was  a  sobering  as  well  as  an  exalting  ele- 
ment in  it ;  for  to  join  the  socialist  movement  demanded 
then  as  now  no  small  degree  of  moral  audacity.  It 
meant  abandonment  of  familiar  paths  ;  it  called  one 
to  brand  as  inadequate  the  conceptions  which  had 
for  centuries  sufficed  the  noblest  spirits.  Doubtless, 
socialism  was  a  product  of  the  same  conditions  as  the 
philanthropy  and  reform  which  had  claimed  the  al- 
legiance of  our  youth ;  but  it  sprang  from  a  deeper 
level,  of  which  one  was  less  conscious,  and  in  its  aspect 
there  was  something  alien  and  menacing,  no  less  than 
alluring.  To  embrace  it  involved  a  subtle  renuncia- 
tion :  and  in  this  very  renunciation  the  seeker  found 
a  secret  delight. 

71 


THE  DILEMMA 


Swiftly  this  delight  passed  into  another :  the  bright 
inspiration  of  "  the  dear  love  of  comrades."  Already, 
socialism  had  gathered  its  adherents  by  thousands  in 
many  lands.  They  formed  a  great  international  party, 
rolling  up  votes,  gaining  power,  and  presenting,  along 
with  much  diversity  in  type,  one  permanent  diagnosis 
of  the  evils  we  deplored,  one  undeviating  conviction 
of  the  only  path  of  escape.  Every  great  imaginative 
leader  of  the  nineteenth  century  had  groped  his  way 
in  profound  loneliness ;  and  however  affectionate  the 
relations  our  pilgrim  had  knowniu  earlier  life,  he  like 
his  masters  had  been  solitary  within.  Now  it  seemed 
that  he  was  to  know  this  pain  no  longer.  He  who 
joins  the  socialist  movement  feels  himself  a  member 
of  a  marching  host  of  comrades,  and  as  they  advance 
against  the  Forts  of  Folly  there  's  music  in  the  air. 

Yet  this  new  joy,  too,  has  its  heart  of  pain ;  for  it  is 
likely  to  be  succeeded  by  a  loneliness  more  poignant 
than  any  experienced  before.  The  recruit  longs  to 
share  his  new-found  faith  and  freedom  with  his  old 
friends  ;  but  to  his  sorrow  he  finds  that  the  majority 
of  them  stay  stubbornly  aloof.  Among  the  new,  he 
soon  discovers  himself  to  be  an  alien.  Their  whole 
mental  atmosphere  is  strange  to  him ;  conversing 
with  them,  he  finds  the  point  of  view  native  to  him 
from  childhood  impatiently  disavowed.  Misconceived 
by  his  former  fellows,  ill  at  ease  among  the  unfamiliar 
terms  and  assumptions  of  the  socialist  camp,  he  learns 
with  grieved  surprise  how  wide  a  gulf  divides  the  ad- 
herents of  the  ideals  he  has  always  cherished  from 

72 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


the  champions  of  the  doctrines  that  have  renewed  his 
social  faith. 

It  is  useless  to  evade  fact.  Between  the  finer  ethical 
schools  and  the  central  socialist  movement,  distrust  per- 
sists. Although  socialist  ideas  are  affecting  more  or 
less  all  theory  and  politics,  and  vague  socialist  sym- 
pathies are  the  order  of  the  day,  the  division  below 
the  surface  is  sharp.  Almost  everywhere,  to  be  sure, 
especially  in  English-speaking  lands,  we  find  socialist 
groups  with  religious  or  even  with  Christian  affilia- 
tions. But  they  are  curiously  slight  in  numerical  or 
intellectual  importance.  "  Christian  Socialism  "  draws 
to  itself  sentimentalists,  cranks,  and  an  occasional 
stray  saint  or  philosopher ;  but  organized  socialism  and 
organized  religion  agree  in  ignoring  it.  Spiritually 
minded  people  either  without  or  within  the  churches 
remain,  in  their  attitude  toward  socialism,  generally 
unaroused,  frequently  hostile,  or,  in  numbers  tmsus- 
pectedly  large,  perplexed  and  hesitant.  It  is  a  strange 
situation.  When  one  considers  how  obvious  is  the 
appeal  of  socialism  to  the  followers  of  that  Carpenter 
who  preached  glad  news  to  the  poor  and  urged  his 
disciples  to  abandon  earthly  possessions,  the  ardor 
with  which  many  individual  Christians  embrace  the 
new  creed  seems  a  matter  of  course :  the  spectacle  of 
the  vast  majority  of  honest  religious  people  standing 
aloof  is  almost  bewildering.  Their  attitude  is  among 
the  chief  paradoxes  of  contemporary  life,  and  it  be- 
hooves religiously  disposed  socialists  to  probe  the  sit- 
uation. Let  us  bend  ourselves  to  the  task. 

73 


THE  DILEMMA 


History  is  excellent  at  explanations:  and  in  analyz- 
ing the  modern  distrust  of  socialism  on  the  part  of 
the  religious  world,  it  is  well  to  begin  by  looking 
back.  At  once  we  face  the  significant  fact  that 
socialism  was  born  of  revolt  from  religion,  as  relig- 
ion was  presented  by  the  contemporary  ecclesiastical 
system. 

The  Church  has  always  given  birth  to  communists ; 
but  she  has  always  systematically  disavowed  them. 
When  socialism  arose,  she  was  at  her  worst.  Glancing 
back  once  more  to  the  birth  of  democracy  in  America 
and  France  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  century,  we 
can  see  that  the  new  power,  which  with  all  its  individ- 
ualistic stress  carried  in  it  the  incipient  socialist  chal- 
lenge, encountered  the  stubborn  opposition  of  the  whole 
ecclesiastical  system.  The  Church  had  long  abandoned 
the  democratic  passion  of  her  youth,  and  ensconced 
herself  comfortably  under  the  wings  of  property  and 
privilege  ;  now  at  the  crisis  she  put  herself  in  position, 
honestly  and  instinctively,  as  champion  of  the  existing 
order.  Therefore  the  radical  forces,  which  had  origin- 
ated apart  from  organized  religion,  developed  a  con- 
scious and  defiant  opposition  to  it.  Inspired  by  intense 
distaste  for  Christianity  as  encountered  in  politics, 
stung  to  scorn  by  the  laissez-faire  attitude  of  a 
Church  which  was  allowing  the  appalling  phenomenon 
of  modern  wage-slavery  to  reach  its  lusty  prime  with 

74 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


scarcely  a  whispered  word  of  protest,  the  social  radi- 
cals expressed  their  reaction  in*  terms  uncompromis- 
ing and  violent. 

Through  all  the  nineteenth  century,  the  situation 
persisted.  As  the  socialist  movement  crystallized  by 
degrees  out  of  the  confused  and  contradictory  ele- 
ments of  radicalism  and  advanced  steadily  in  passion 
and  purpose,  it  has  confronted  steady  and  deliberate 
hostility  from  the  Church  on  the  Continent,  disheart- 
ening indifference  from  the  Church  in  England.  Small 
wonder  if  it  has  taken  defiant  stand,  not  only  anti- 
Christian  but  anti-religious ! 

It  reacted  against  more  than  an  ecclesiastical  in- 
stitution, it  challenged  the  ideals  of  which  that  insti- 
tution was  the  guardian.  Jts  exponents,  friends  and 
foes,  are  inclined  to  find  its  intimate  source  in  the 
dying  out  of  Christian  theology.  Allied  by  the  neces- 
sities of  origin  with  the  forces  of  self-assertion  and  re- 
volt, it  fought  the  church  teaching  of  submission,  for 
it  saw  in  such  teaching  the  reproduction  on  the  moral 
plane  of  that  aristocratic  and  feudal  view  of  the  uni- 
verse which  it  had  arisen  to  destroy.  It  reacted  in- 
dignant from  the  mediaeval  emphasis  on  the  salvation 
of  the  soul :  had  not  such  emphasis  with  its  attend- 
ant hope  for  the  reversal  of  earthly  values  in  a  safe 
eternity  been  used  from  time  immemorial  to  keep  the 
lower  classes  tame? 

As  the  movement  acquired  animus,  it  experienced 
that  inveterate  need  of  a  Credo  with  which  not  even 
the  most  opportunist  utilitarianism  can  dispense.  At 

75 


THE  DILEMMA 


this  point,  the  theories  of  economic  determinism  and 
the  class-struggle  appeared  upon  the  scene :  — 

In  every  historical  epoch,  the  prevailing  mode  of  eco- 
nomic production  and  exchange  and  the  social  organization 
necessarily  following,  form  the  basis  upon  which  is  built  up, 
and  from  which  alone  can  be  explained,  the  political  and 
intellectual  history  of  that  epoch ;  consequently  the  whole 
history  of  mankind  (since  the  dissolution  of  primitive  tribal 
society,  holding  land  in  common  ownership)  has  been  a 
history  of  class-struggles ;  contests  between  oppressed  and 
ruling  classes ;  the  history  of  these  class-struggles  forms  a 
series  of  evolutions  in  which,  nowadays,  a  stage  has  been 
reached  where  the  exploited  and  oppressed  class  —  the  pro- 
letariat —  cannot  attain  its  emancipation  from  the  sway  of 
the  exploiting  and  ruling  class,  —  the  bourgeoisie,  —  without 
at  the  same  time  and  once  and  for  all  emancipating  society 
at  large  from  all  exploitation,  oppression,  class-distinctions 
and  class-struggles. 

Such  was  the  "  fundamental  proposition"  which,  as 
Engels  wrote  in  his  preface  to  the  "  Communist  Mani- 
festo," "  is  destined  to  do  for  history  what  Darwin's 
theory  has  done  for  biology."  Nothing  could  seem  more 
remote  from  the  attitude  which  sees  in  the  soul  the  only 
moving  force  in  the  universe,  and  would  dissolve  class- 
bitterness  in  the  solvent  of  brotherhood.  The  Uto- 
pians, from  St.  Simon  down,  had  been  bred  in  the  same 
school  as  the  theologians  and  used  the  same  termino- 
logy, however  different  their  ideas.  This  new  language, 
more  deeply  disquieting,  clinched  the  anti-orthodox 
character  of  the  socialist  movement. 

It  is  easy,  it  is  also  futile,  to  frame  an  apologia  for 
76 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


socialism  which  shall  leave  these  doctrines  out.  To  be 
sure,  that  desire  to  limit  private  property  which  we 
have  described  as  the  central  socialist  tenet  is  inde- 
pendent of  them.  Plato  would  have  scored  economic 
determinism  well,  and  one  does  not  see  Wyclif  or 
More  hobnobbing  with  an  advocate  of  the  class-strug- 
gle. Nevertheless,  only  as  these  clear-cut  doctrines 
came  to  its  aid  did  socialism  enter  the  arena  of  world- 
forces.  Its  Utopian  schools  still  afford  attractive  read- 
ing, full  of  imaginative  beauty  and  aspiration  :  in  life 
they  counted  for  nothing.  When  the  ideas  of  the 
"  Communist  Manifesto  "  were  launched,  true  socialism 
began  its  career :  for  economic  determinism  gave  the 
socialist  dream  a  scientific  basis,  and  the  class-struggle 
furnished  it  with  a  practical  lever. 

From  1848  to  our  own  day,  these  doctrines,  deemed 
both  fatalistic  and  inflammatory  outcome  of  scientific 
materialism,  have  filled  the  religious  world  with  hor- 
ror and  alarm.  We  know  that  in  building  a  railroad, 
moral  forces  have  no  direct  function ;  but  we  love  to 
think  that  in  building  civilization  they  must  hold  the 
leading  role.  So  the  alienation  of  the  Church  from 
socialism  was  completed ;  and  so  we  were  all  caught 
in  a  vicious  circle,  within  which  we  still  gyrate.  Mov- 
ing distracted  within  it,  we  find  the  blame  difficult  to 
fix ;  but  if  we  look  back  to  origins  we  can  hardly  evade 
fastening  it  on  the  Church,  for  sfre  was  first  in  the 
field.  Did  she  wish  to  undo  the  effect  of  her  past,  she 
would  have  to  express  radical  sympathies  with  uncom- 
promising and  conspicuous  clearness.  This  she  has 

77 


THE  DILEMMA 


never  yet  been  ready  to  do.  Increasingly  restless, 
haunted  by  social  compunction,  at  times  in  the  Prot- 
estant world  opening  her  doors  cautiously  to  socialist 
speakers  and  her  mind  to  socialist  thought,  she  has 
yet  never  to  this  day,  either  through  her  leaders  or 
through  any  widespread  movement  on  the  part  of  her 
more  spiritual  children,  frankly  abandoned  her  old 
alliance  with  monopoly  and  privilege,  and  ranged  her- 
self openly  on  the  side  of  the  People  and  of  radical 
social  change.  Until  she  does  so,  the  historic  situation 
must  in  the  main  persist.  The  underworld,  and  those 
who  throw  in  their  lot  with  it,  will  continue  to  view 
her  with  sullen  distaste  as  an  enemy  instead  of  welcom- 
ing her  as  an  ally.  Any  one  who  keeps  perspective  in 
mind,  therefore,  apprehends  contemporary  conditions 
without  surprise. 

None  the  less  does  he  find  them  disconcerting,  if 
he  be  religiously  disposed.    To  be   sure,  the   official 

1  socialist  movement  scrupulously  proclaims  religious 
neutrality.  That  is  matter  of  words  and  diplomacy. 
Latin  countries,  where  logic  is  relentless  if  not  pro- 
found, take  antagonism  between  socialism  and  Chris- 
tianity for  granted  as  the  key  to  the  modern  drama. 
One  can  hardly  exaggerate  either  the  anti-religious 
animus  in  the  effective  sections  of  the  socialist  party, 
or  the  anti-socialist  virus  of  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  The  social  democratic  press,  both  comic  and 
serious,  spits  and  claws  at  the  Church,  —  the  religious 
organs  spit  back.  Life  in  any  French  or  Italian  town 
convinces  one  in  a  month  of  the  sharp  alignment  of 

78 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


conviction.  If  you  claim  to  be  both  Christian  and 
socialist,  you  will  be  told  by  any  intelligent  citizen 
that  you  cannot  be  both  black  and  white  at  f.he  same 
moment.  A  social  democrat  will  refuse  to  serve  on  the 
committee  of  an  industrial  school  if  he  finds  that  the 
exercises  are  to  be  opened  by  prayer.  Why  multiply  in- 
stances ?  Does  not  the  Roman  Church  in  any  country, 
for  that  matter,  officially  announce  that  she  refuses  ab- 
solution to  any  known  member  of  the  socialist  party  ? 
Says  that  delightful  Catholic,  M.  Hilaire  Belloc :  — 

The  Catholic  Church  is  throughout  the  world  opposed 
to  the  modern  theory  of  society  which  is  called  socialism. 
That  is  a  plain  fact  which  both  parties  to  the  quarrel  rec- 
ognize, and  which  third  parties,  though  they  often  explain 
it  ill,  recognize  also.  It  is  further  evident  that  the  nearer 
the  socialist  theory  comes  to  its  moment  of  experiment,  the 
larger  the  number  of  souls  over  which  it  obtains  possession, 
the  more  definite  and  the  more  uncompromising  does  Cath- 
olic opposition  to  it  become. 

In  Protestant  countries,  the  situation  is  milder ;  yet 
here  too  the  instinct  of  separation  persists.  Even  in  the 
United  States,  where  political  complications  are  tra- 
ditionally unknown  in  religion,  a  local  socialist  victory 
at  the  polls,  as  the  recent  victory  in  Milwaukee,  will 
rally  all  the  Catholic  forces  to  bitter  and  often  successful 
fight,  while  the  Protestant  Churches  pursue  the  tactics 
of  masterly  indifference.  In  the  socialist  schools,  the 
anti-religious  current  sets  strong  beneath  all  decorous 
disclaimers.  "  I  took  my  own  course  years  ago,"  writes 
Robert  Blatchford  in  "  The  Clarion  "  :  "  Believing  that 

79 


THE  DILEMMA 


all  supernatural  religions  were  inimical  to  human  pro- 
gress, and  foreseeing  that  a  conflict  between  socialism 
and  religion  so-called  was  inevitable,  I  attacked  the 
Christian  religion.  It  had  to  be  done  and  will  have 
to  be  finished."  A  Unionist  paper  retorts :  "  Here  is 
the  blasphemous  creed  of  the  socialists,  who  deny  the 
existence  of  God  and  the  truth  of  all  religion.  These 
quotations  are  circulated  with  shame  and  regret,  but 
in  the  present  crisis  there  is  no  alternative  but  to  show 
what  the  socialist  doctrines  really  mean."  Well- 
informed  people  may  srnile  at  the  crudity  of  Blatchford 
and  his  opponents ;  but  really,  we  receive  no  different 
impression  when  we  turn  from  socialism,  popular  and 
practical,  to  the  more  intellectual  phases  of  the  move- 
ment. Through  the  writing  of  the  leaders,  increasingly 
guarded  though  it  be,  from  Marx  to  Jaures,  runs  an  • 
undertone  of  bitter  revolt  from  the  older  spiritualities. 
These  men  delight  in  assuming  that  the  scientific  atti- 
tude is  materialistic,  and  that  their  determination  to 
conquer  the  resources  of  this  world  derives  its  energy 
from  the  loss  of  interest  in  another.  Physical  progress 
is  the  one  means  they  recognize  of  promoting  moral 
values.  What  wonder  if  people  who  believe  these 
values  to  be  independent  of  economic  circumstances 
are  outraged?  Who  can  blame  those  who  feel  deli- 
cately and  deeply  the  things  of  the  Spirit  if  when  they 
find  socialists  everywhere  violently  proclaiming  their 
intention  to  replace  the  religion  of  the  soul  by  a  religion 
of  the  healthy  flesh,  they  take  them  at  their  word  and 
hesitate  before  the  socialist  creed  ? 

80 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


III 

We  must  keep  our  historic  perspective  in  mind  if 
we  set  ourselves  to  analyze  that  modern  aversion  to 
socialism  which  still  obtains  so  much  more  generally 
than  the  acceptance  of  it.  Even  so,  our  task  will  not 
be  easy.  "  Mixed,  man's  existence,"  —  especially  mod- 
ern man's.  Brave  thought  to-day  can  rarely  hope  for 
the  sort  of  certainty  which  men  attained  in  simpler 
times.  Instead  of  choice  between  plain  right  and  wrong, 
true  and  false,  we  face  the  duty  of  subtle  discrimina- 
tion. 

In  the  contemporary  distrust  of  socialism,  so  far  as 
that  distrust  is  based  on  moral  grounds  as  distinct 
from  questions  of  feasibility,  we  may  distinguish  three 
strata,  or  zones. 

In  the  first  we  encounter  the  vast  solid  opposition 
of  all  the  interests  which  would  suffer  did  social  equal- 
ity win  the  day.  Bourgeois  class-consciousness;  the 
forces  of  privilege  and  monopoly  ;  the  tenacious  respect 
for  property  per  se  as  sacrosanct :  the  angered  con- 
servatism of  all  those  to  whom  the  present  order  is 
friendly  and  fostering;  —  these  view  socialism  with 
stubborn  hate  that  glows  hotter  year  by  year.  We 
may  add  to  these  forces  so  virulently  positive  others 
as  heavily  negative  :  the  apathetic  indolence,  the  timid- 
ity in  anticipation  of  change,  the  incredulity  in  con- 
fronting it,  which  clog  life  always,  —  mere  barnacles 
if  you  will  on  the  keel  of  the  Ship  of  State,  but  thick- 
encrusted  enough  to  retard  her  progress. 

81 


THE   DILEMMA 


Orthodox  socialists  of  the  older  type  consider  this 
the  only  opposition  that  counts.  And  they  respect 
while  they  fight  it.  It  is  precisely  what  we  were  bidden 
to  expect  by  Engels's  famous  "  proposition."  The  in- 
veterate impulse  of  the  Haves  to  defend  their  posses- 
sions is  the  certain  outcome  of  the  economic  order.  It 
is  a  natural  force,  met  by  the  opposing  tide,  now  stead- 
ily rising,  —  the  demand  of  the  proletariat  for  econo- 
mic expansion.  We  witness  on  both  sides  the  instinctive 
urge  of  life,  —  non-moral,  irresponsible,  mighty,  as  the 
pressure  of  the  sea  up  the  sands.  And  the  socialists  tell 
us  that  it  is  only  a  question  of  time  when  the  forces  of 
capitalism  shall  be  routed,  just  as  certainly  as  the  feu- 
dal aristocracy  retreated  before  the  invasion  of  these 
forces  themselves.  .Men  cannot  prevent  the  inevitable 
change,  but  they  can  accelerate  it,  by  educating  the 
workers  to  understand  the  nature  of  the  struggle  in 
which  they  are  unconsciously  engaged.  To  increase  their 
impetus,  to  develop  their  confused  and  more  or  less  mis- 
guided instincts  into  conscious  intelligent  pressure, 
strong  enough  to  overwhelm  by  mere  might  and  mass 
the  opposition  of  the  other  classes,  is  the  one  policy  by 
which  the  socialist  advance  to  triumph  can  be  assured. 
Proletarians  of  all  lands,  unite !  It  is  the  only  war-cry. 
In  that  world-drama  controlled  by  economic  necessity, 
the  self  -  assertion  born  of  industrial  pressure  is  the 
sole  protagonist,  and  those  gross  obstacles  to  social 
advance  proceeding  from  the  outraged  passion  of  self- 
protection  on  the  part  of  the  privileged  classes  are 
the  only  obstacles  to  be  feared. 

82 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


This  is  naturally  the  whole  story  to  the  economic  de- 
terminist  of  the  cruder  sort.  But  probably  no  one  ever 
really  sums  up  life  in  these  formula,  though  many 
people  think  they  do.  There  is  a  spiritual  dynamic  in 
the  world,  and  we  all  know  it.  Economic  conditions 
may  be  the  rail  determining  the  route  over  which  the 
engine  rushes,  but  psychical  force  is  the  electricity 
which  carries  it  on.  Those  finer  impulses,  subtle  as 
they  are  all-pervading,  which  play  their  part  in  impel- 
ling to  social  change,  are  indubitably  a  product  in  their 
turn  of  economic  life :  as  electricity,  no  less  than  iron 
and  steel,  belongs  to  the  natural  order.  But  they  can 
be  most  effectively  studied  and  wisely  utilized  if  they 
are  put  in  a  category  by  themselves. 

From  the  zone  of  ingenuously  harsh  opposition  to 
socialism  on  the  part  of  the  forces  of  self-interest  we 
penetrate  readily  and  swiftly  into  that  second  region 
where  a  nobler  distrust  obtains.  In  its  more  obvious 
phases,  however,  this  distrust  is  due  less  to  any  study 
of  the  essential  socialist  philosophy  than  to  observation 
of  current  socialist  affiliations.  It  is  born  of  the  prac- 
tical situation.  People  do  take  things  at  their  face 
value.  When  they  note  the  clash  between  clericalism 
and  social  democracy  all  over  Europe,  when  they  read 
such  passages  as  we  have  quoted  from  "  The  Clarion," 
or  the  insolent  clever  pages  of  a  writer  like  Jack  Lon- 
don, or  catch  the  undertones  in  the  current  socialist 
press,  still  more  when  they  realize  the  considerable  num- 
ber of  socialists  who  set  marriage  at  defiance,  and  assert 
temperament  and  desire  unrestricted  except  by  hygiene 

83 


THE  DILEMMA 


to  be  the  guides  in  sex  relations,  they  pause  and  fear. 
To  throngs  of  people,  the  word  socialism  connotes 
first  and  foremost  antagonism  to  religion  and  the  fam- 
ily. The  conception  is  encouraged  by  all  Catholic 
priests,  and  by  some  persons,  like  an  ex-President  of 
the  United  States,  who  certainly  ought  to  know  bet- 
ter ;  and  it  does  receive  color  from  the  convictions  and 
language  of  many  socialists. 

It  has  been  our  contention  that  all  this  tone  in  con- 
temporary socialism  is  due  to  accident ;  and  if  this  be 
true,  the  opposition  to  socialism  in  this  second  zone 
ought  to  be  stopped  as  rapidly  as  possible.  Fortunately, 
many  people  agree  with  us,  and  so,  while  the  majority 
perhaps  still  hold  aloof  on  these  grounds,  we  see  a 
steady  accession  of  idealists  to  the  socialist  ranks. 
They  are  received  with  more  or  less  kindly  contempt, 
but  they  hold  their  own  till  they  have  vindicated  their 
loyalty  and  grit. 

These  converts  disentangle  elements  born  of  circum- 
stance from  the  essential  points.  They  know  that  a 
great  movement  of  revolt  must  take  long  to  work 
clear  of  violent  and  anarchical  elements ;  so  the  rev- 
olutionary talk  still  lingering  in  socialist  circles  — 
feebler  and  fainter  from  year  to  year,  for  that  matter, 
even  in  the  extreme  factions  —  does  not  disturb  them. 
Neither  does  the  animus  against  religion  and  marriage, 
unpleasant  though  it  be.  They  perceive  the  fact  — 
simple  enough,  one  would  think  —  that  a  man  may 
want  to  limit  his  neighbor's  right  to  private  property 
without  desiring  to  go  shares  ^in  his  wife.  And  they 

84 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


are  also  aware,  as  socialists  indeed  are  never  weary  of 
asserting,  that  religion  is  a  private  matter,  and  that  I 
socialism  is  purely  an  economic  proposition.  So  far  as 
that  goes,  they  are  clear  that  the  destruction  of  privi- 
lege for  which  it  calls  is  far  more  in  harmony  with 
the  terror  of  wealth  evinced  by  Jesus  and  other  re- 
ligious leaders  than  are  the  cheerfully  acquisitive  ways 
of  the  modern  world. 

So  they  have  faith  to  believe  that  only  time  is  want- 
ing to  clarify  the  issues.  The  objections  to  socialism 
most  common  to-day,  being  due  to  the  politico-ecclesi- 
astical confusions  of  the  last  century,  they  hold  to  be 
transitory.  Socialism  will  win  the  suffrages  of  all  dis- 
interested people,  as  its  true  nature  appears  by  de- 
grees :  and  these,  whom  your  idealist  is  always  inclined 
to  believe  in  the  majority,  will  unite  with  an  educated 
proletariat  in  overcoming  those  crass  enemies  of  the 
new  day,  —  misconceptions,  conventionality,  cowardice 
and  greed. 

IV 

It  is  a  delightful  picture,  and  we  should  like  to  con- 
firm it  at  the  end  of  our  study.  But  that  end  is  not 
yet.  There  is  another,  still  more  central,  zone  of  oppo- 
sition. Deeper  than  the  region  where  the  powerful 
bonds  of  interest  and  class-prejudice  prevail,  or  that 
second  region  where  conscientious  scruples  born  of 
obvious  and  superficial  phenomena  are  the  order  of 
the  day,  lies  another  circle.  It  fades  into  the  last  as 
belt  into  belt  of  the  rainbow,  but  the  colors  are  distinct. 

85 


THE  DILEMMA 


In  the  second  circle,  historical  and  practical  consider- 
ations govern,  in  the  third,  abstract  and  philosophical. 
The  first  zone  was  that  of  Prejudice  ;  the  second,  that 
of  Appearances  ;  the  third  is  that  of  Kealities.  Here, 
within  the  innermost,  the  old  struggle  still  persists  ; 
for  here  inhabit  those  finer  spirits  who  are  genuinely  dis- 
interested, competent  to  escape  the  superficial  delusions 
of  history,  and  to  discern  aright  the  trend  of  deeper 
forces  so  often  contradicted  by  the  eddies  on  the  surface 
of  the  stream.  The  ultimate  fate  of  movements  and 
nations  is  determined,  not  in  either  of  the  other  zones, 
but  in  this,  seemingly  so  remote  from  the  practical  world. 
Each  of  us  by  necessity  of  his  nature  and  education 
moves  in  the  first  circle,  and  also  in  the  second  ;  but  not 
in  these  only.  To  our  credit  be  it  spoken,  there  is  no 
rest  for  some  of  us  till  we  have  entered  the  third  and 
met  our  problems  frankly,  in  that  sphere  of  final  real- 
ities where,  so  far  as  our  finite  powers  admit,  the  false 
relations,  due  to  accidents  of  propinquity  and  origin, 
into  which  things  so  often  fall  in  the  world,  are  seen 
in  all  their  absurdity,  and  ideas  confront  each  other, 
friendly  or  hostile  as  the  case  may  be,  but  honest  and 
unmasked. 

When  all  masks  have  fallen,  when  delusions  are 
outgrown,  and  prejudice  and  appearance  alike  discred- 
ited, what  have  socialism  and  the  religious  conscience 
to  say  to  each  other  ?  Will  they  discover  abashed  that 
they  are  allies  after  all  ? 

Many  are  the  people  who  long  to  think  so.  But 
unwelcome  questions  will  intrude.  Appearances  some- 

86 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


times  contradict  reality,  but  sometimes  they  reflect  it. 
Perhaps  the  antagonism  we  deplore  is  due  not  to  his- 
toric circumstances  alone,  but  to  a  divergence  at  the 
heart,  of  which  those  very  circumstances  are  the  prod- 
uct. The  Roman  Church,  in  which  that  antagonism 
centres,  has  often  proved  short-sighted ;  yet  not  even 
her  enemies  can  deny  that  her  flair  is  keen.  It  may 
be  that  her  attacks  on  socialism  spring  from  a  deeper 
cause  than  distaste  for  a  party  which  happens  to-day 
to  be  fighting  the  hierarchy:  possibly  these  attacks 
imply  perception  just  and  warranted  of  a  rival  at  the 
centre,  whose  promises  to  satisfy  the  ageless  hunger 
of  the  secret  heart  may  prove  more  alluring  than  the 
Gospel  of  Christ. 

Listen  to  that  clever  essayist,  Price  Collier,  as  he 
expounds  what  he  calls  the  "  Pagan  doctrine  "  of  social- 
ism:— 

It  is  the  ghastly  portent  of  the  times  that  social  and  politi- 
cal forces  are  demanding  that  men  shall  work  less,  instead 
of  making  it  wholesome  for  them  to  work  more.  ...  It  is 
easy  to  see  how  this  new  doctrine  has  arisen.  As  the  belief 
in  the  supernatural,  or  to  put  it  in  the  common  parlance  of 
the  street,  the  belief  in  God  has  grown  less  strong,  there 
has  come  a  preposterous  belief  in  man.  ...  It  has  per- 
colated down  through  the  masses  in  the  coarse  form  of  a  mere 
vulgar  and  frankly  selfish  socialism.  .  .  .  The  fundamental 
philosophy  underlying  all  forms  of  socialism,  disguise  it  as 
you  will,  is  the  worship  of  man.  The  pandering  to  this  new 
doctrine  in  the  name  of  Christian  socialism  is  simply  loose- 
minded.  The  pith  of  Christianity  and  the  pith  of  socialism 
are  as  the  poles  apart.  .  .  .  Christianity  is  at  least  virile 

87 


THE  DILEMMA 


enough  to  crucify  its  God,  and  to  announce  that  pain  points 
the  way  to  salvation.  This  new  god  is  to  be  fed  and  edu- 
cated for  nothing  as  a  child,  is  to  work  only  eight  hours  as 
an  adult,  is  to  be  pensioned  at  seventy,  and  never  to  bear  a 
cross,  much  less  be  nailed  upon  one,  if  by  any  means  it 
may  be  avoided.  .  .  .  Whenever  the  individual  or  any 
class  in  the  community,  rich  or  poor,  balks  at  labor,  at 
pain,  at  sacrifice,  at  the  Cross  in  short,  you  have  in  that 
individual  or  that  class  a  menace  to  the  community  and  to 
the  State,  and  it  is  tbis  very  individual  and  class  that  the 
professional  philosopher,  the  political  and  economic  senti- 
mentalist, is  doing  his  best  to  encourage.1 

This  socialist  civilization,  so  ardently  desired, — 
would  it  really  be  good  for  us  if  attained?  What 
reason  have  we  to  suppose  that  widespread  ease,  and 
freedom  from  the  inequalities  and  anxieties  that  hedge 
our  path  to-day,  would  further  our  higher  interests? 
Are  the  socialists  perhaps  correct  when  they  scent  an 
enemy  to  their  avowed  aim  of  universal  well-being  in 
that  strong  inward  conviction  of  the  religious  conscious- 
ness, alike  in  East  and  West,  that  subjection  and  suffer- 
ing are  the  higher  law  and  the  path  to  fullness  of  life? 
And  are  the  Catholics  perhaps  correct  in  turn,  when 
they  foresee  that  impending  conflict  described  by 
Father  Hugh  Benson  in  his  disconcerting  story, "  The 
Lord  of  the  World,"  when  the  forces  of  evil  shall  ap- 
pear under  the  banner  of  humanitarianism  and  fr^e- 
dom,  while  the  armies  of  the  Lord  apparently  indorse 
all  the  sordid  miseries  and  futile  strife  of  the  civilization 
we  know,  on  the  plea  that  the  soul  can  best  find  itself 
1  England  and  the  English.  Scribner,  1909. 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


in  a  world  whose  very  horrors  lead  it  to  distrust  nature, 
and  to  flee  from  the  temporal  to  an  eternal  refuge  ? 

Deep  in  many  religious  hearts  lies  a  fear  lest  that 
whole  effort  to  rehabilitate  the  natural  order  of  which 
socialism  is  the  climax  be  founded  in  falsity.  In  the 
attempt  to  check  from  without  private  greed  and  so- 
cial misery,  they  suspect  a  gallant  blunder,  springing 
unconsciously  from  the  very  materialism  it  deplores. 
Let  us  be  bold,  let  us  speak  our  full  mind.  The 
threads  of  the  flesh  have  always  run  athwart  the 
threads  of  the  spirit,  and  if  we  seek  to  run  them  paral- 
lel we  shall  find  that  the  whole  social  fabric  drops  to 
pieces.  These  fears  may  seem  heroic  to  the  verge  of 
callousness ;  yet  we  must  respect  their  inner  motive. 
They  rise  from  a  level  hidden  to  the  gaze  of  the  mere 
sociologist,  #nd  spring  from  a  protecting  jealousy  for 
the  truths  that  are  the  safeguard  of  the  soul. 


Beneath  the  crust  of  matter-of-fact  heathenism 
which  appalls  Oriental  observers  of  our  non-Christian- 
ity, religious  earnestness  has  never  perished.  True,  for 
many  generations  social  idealism  has  been  at  low  ebb 
within  the  Church.  This  ebb  is  a  modern  phenome- 
non, which  would  have  seemed  strange  in  earlier  days. 
During  more  than  two  thirds  of  its  career,  an  impas- 
sioned reverence  for  poverty  had  differentiated  the 
standards  of  the  Church  from  those  of  the  world,  and  its 
summons  of  elect  spirits  to  the  corporate  monastic  life 
had  dramatically  preserved  at  least  the  shadow  and 

89 


THE  DILEMMA 


symbol  of  fraternal  and  communal  relations.  Long 
before  socialism  or  even  democracy  appeared,  these 
things  were  past.  The  radicals  moreover  are  right  in 
saying  that  all  through  the  revolutionary  epoch,  and  far 
into  the  nineteenth  century,  the  Church  retained  that 
aristocratic  view  of  the  universe  which  had  been,  as 
already  noted,  the  natural  reproduction  on  the  spiritual 
plane  of  the  social  assumptions  of  feudalism.  This  in 
itself  was  sufficient  to  inhibit  its  power  to  welcome 
democratic  ideals.  But  if  it  had  divorced  Lady  Pov- 
erty and  wedded  Respectability,  if  it  thought  little  of 
brotherhood  and  freedom,  if  indeed  it  never  thought 
at  all  in  social  terms,  none  the  less  did  its  instinct  tell 
it  that  it  had  something  inestimably  precious  to  defend. 
This  was  its  conception  of  personal  holiness,  the  one 
indestructible  achievement  of  organized  religion.  And 
through  all  quaint  transformations  of  the  Church's 
social  attitude,  this  achievement  had  remained  intact. 
Even  in  the  eighteenth  century  flourished  a  Wesley 
and  a  Law ;  even  in  the  nineteenth,  a  Newman  and  a 
Robertson. 

As  the  last  century  wore  on  and  issues  cleared,  the 
religious  consciousness  gradually  awoke  to  the  challenge 
of  the  socialist  ideal.  And  the  bewilderment  it  expe- 
rienced was  not  ignoble.  Socialism  exercised  a  strange 
attraction ;  for  pity  was  the  most  conspicuous  modern 
product  of  Christian  ethics,  and  here  was  promise  of 
healing  for  many  of  the  evils  it  found  most  intolerable. 
Yet  the  distrust  which  we  have  seen  mingling  with 
attraction  from  the  beginning  was  rooted,  at  least 

90 


THE  TUG  'S  TO  COME 


partly,  in  what  was  noblest  and  purest  in  Christian 
life.  Even  when  most  drawn  to  the  new  gospel,  the 
spirit,  in  its  own  despite,  felt  ill  at  ease.  And  it  asked 
its  own  persistent  question,  What  protection  to  per- 
sonal holiness  does  your  new  ideal  afford  ? 

Young  social  democracy,  as  we  know,  impatiently 
refused  to  answer,  and  Religion  was  driven  to  formu- 
late her  own  reply.  In  the  midst  of  many  incertitudes, 
one  thing  she  knew :  if  the  chance  of  spiritual  attain- 
ment were  to  be  lessened  for  one  human  soul  by  the 
proposed  changes,  then  decent  houses  and  adequate 
nourishment  for  the  entire  race  would  be  to  her  no 
compensation  at  all.  Since,  rightly  or  wrongly,  she  saw 
reason  to  doubt  the  new  thinking,  and  to  fear,  strange 
though  the  paradox  sound,  that  economic  servitude 
might  be  the  best  condition  for  spiritual  freedom,  only 
one  course  was  open  to  her.  With  extreme  yet  dimin- 
ishing hesitancy,  she  has  been  formulating  her  doubts 
and  finding  her  bearings. 

We  dare,  thenr  no  more  attribute  the  anti-socialist 
movement  to  a  shallow  reading  of  circumstance  past 
and  present  than  to  the  dread  of  upheaval  or  the  dis- 
like to  lose  the  perquisites  of  the  present  order.  It 
rests  on  the  honest  belief  that  socialism  is  identified 
with  a  materialistic  conception  ;  that  it  proposes  a 
mechanical  solution  for  spiritual  ills ;  that  the  pas- 
sions it  utilizes  spring  from  the  lower  and  more  danger- 
ous reaches  of  life ;  and  that  if  its  goal  were  attained 
the  resultant  condition  would  be  such  as  to  imperil  if 
not  destroy  the  finer  values  of  character. 

91 


THE  DILEMMA 


The  difficulties  met  in  the  first  and  second  zone 
could  be  discussed  and  dismissed  in  a  couple  of  pages. 
Those  which  we  have  now  briefly  summarized  must 
occupy  us  through  the  rest  of  the  book.  For  it  is 
natural  that  the  movement  Religion  has  refused  to  in- 
dorse should  have  drawn  farther  and  farther  from  her ; 
how  should  the  champions  of  the  dispossessed  fail  to 
regard  with  shocked  disgust  a  power  which  claims  to 
save  the  world  through  love,  and  at  the  same  time 
timidly  acquiesces  in  a  social  order  best  described  as 
the  legalization  of  hate  ?  We  shall  never  escape  the 
vicious  circle  of  mutual  repulsion  between  religion  and 
socialism  by  pursuing  and  fleeing  in  the  old  round.  If 
there  is  any  hope,  it  must  be  found  in  the  new  art  of 
aviation  ;  we  must  try  to  fashion  wings. 


CHAPTER  V 

THE   APOLOGIA   OF   RELIGION 


RELIGION  is  well  aware  that  mere  rebuttal  is  poor 
business.  Whatever  its  faults,  when  there  is  any  life 
in  it  at  all,  it  seeks  the  positive.  To  attack  social- 
ism as  a  living  political  movement  hostile  to  church 
and  family  is  simple  enough,  but  to  stop  there  is  to 
leave  hosts  of  devout  and  sincere  people  unsatisfied. 
They  cry,  What  next?  They  remind  their  leaders 
that  they  are  in  desperate  need  of  guidance  and  com- 
fort ;  and,  pointing  out  that  a  new  apologia  of  Christ- 
ianity is  demanded  by  every  age,  they  insist  that  if 
the  Church  rejects  socialism  it  must  present  some  coun- 
ter-philosophy, which  shall  silence  the  specious  claims 
before  which  Religion  was  at  first  so  stubbornly  dumb. 
And  year  by  year,  as  difficulties  become  focused  and 
vision  clears,  such  an  apologia  is  shaping  itself  in  the 
minds  of  serious  thinkers.  Its  first  definite  expression 
was  perhaps  the  Encyclical  issued  by  Leo  XIII  in 
1891,  its  last  word  is  not  yet  uttered.  But  we  can 
already  see  the  general  lines  on  which  it  will  be  fash- 
ioned and  the  ideal  it  will  seek  to  present. 

Fully  to  apprehend  the  code  deemed  competent  in 
religious  quarters  to  counteract  the  allurements  of 
socialism  is  our  next  duty.  We  have  already  sug- 

93 


THE  DILEMMA 


gested  its  point  of  departure.  While  far  from  com- 
placent defense  of  things  as  they  are,  it  is  yet  on 
the  whole  indifferent  to  social  change.  On  large 
lines,  it  disclaims  responsibility  for  the  present  social 
order,  —  partly  holding  civilization  as  we  have  it  to 
be  the  expression  of  a  human  nature  never  likely  to 
be  altered,  partly  scornful  of  the  expectation  that  the 
soul  can^be  profited  by  a  change  in  circumstance.  It 
holds  the^modern  stress  on  the  trappings  of  life  to  be 
ignominious  and  craven,  and  claims  that  under  any  con- 
ditions whatever,  of  wealth  or  poverty,  the  free  spirit 
can  hold  its  own :  — 

We  may  not  hope  by  outward  change  to  win 

The  comfort  and  the  joy  whose  sources  are  within. 

Why  aspire  to  a  state  mechanically  regulated  by  an 
ingenious  system,  instead  of  created  from  within  by 
vital  spiritual  force?  How  indorse  an  ideal  to  be 
reached,  by  its  own  confession,  through  stimulating 
that  selfish  assertion  of  natural  rights  which  it  is  the 
very  aim  of  religion  to  check  by  supernatural  grace  ? 
Produced  by  the  class  war,  maintained  by  repressive 
legislation,  the  socialist  state  would  be  sheer  travesty 
of  that  loving  brotherhood  we  all  desire,  born  of  vol- 
untary sympathies  and  sacrifice.  Through  the  equal- 
ization of  property  it  might  indeed  attain  a  superficial 
semblance  of  justice  ;  but  is  that  end  worth  attaining  by 
the  cowardly  expedient  of  impoverishing  life  through 
blotting  out  the  factor  of  struggle  which  experience 
has  proved  essential  to  personality  and  invaluable  to 

94 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  RELIGION 

the  training  of  manhood?  The  monotonous  level  of 
external  well-being  which  socialism  proposes  would  for- 
feit tlje  finest  moral  results  that  civilization  has  won. 
And  as  the  advocates  of  religion  dwell  on  these 
results,  their  enthusiasm  rises :  while  with  wistf ulness 
and  terror  they  perceive  the  present  order  threatened 
with  dissolution,  the  assets,  both  moral  and  spiritual, 
of  that  order  appear  infinitely  precious.  To  hear 
the  modern  demagogue,  we  should  suppose  that  all 
employers  were  brutal,  all  dependents  cowed  into  sub- 
mission or  roused  to  rage,  and  society  divided  into 
warring  classes,  controlled  exclusively  by  the  fierce 
laws  of  economic  greed.  Leave  the  lecture  hall  where 
agitators  are  declaiming,  move  out  into  the  normal 
world  where  men  meet  in  countless  interwoven  rela- 
tions, and  grant  the  falsity  of  the  picture.  Life  is  never 
easy.  Cruelty  and  injustice  abound.  Yet  in  the  main, 
human  relationships  as  evolved  through  the  ages  con- 
stitute not  only  potentially  but  actually  the  finest 
among  fine  arts.  The  sweet  ministries  of  charity,  the 
heroic  sweep  of  effort  and  aspiration,  the  upward 
flight  of  sacrificial  passion,  greet  us  on  every  hand. 
These  are  all,  we  shall  be  told,  the  results  of  social 
inequality,  and  inconceivable  in  the  socialist  state. 
Protecting  chivalry  shown  by  the  strong  toward  the 
weak,  loyal  service  rendered  by  the  weak  toward  the 
strong,  are  realities  common  and  sweet.  Countless 
employers  care  for  their  employees  with  a  disinterested 
devotion  that  costs  not  only  thought  and  sentiment, 
but  the  surrender  of  profits.  Countless  dependents 

95 


THE  DILEMMA 


show  a  touching  fidelity  to  their  masters.  In  spite  of 
the  intricacies  of  the  modern  domestic  problem,  affec- 
tion between  mistresses  and  servants  continually  out- 
runs business  considerations,  and  shines  with  a  grace 
and  light  peculiarly  its  own.  True,  in  the  industrial 
world  the  personal  note  grows  harder  to  maintain  as 
centralization  proceeds,  and  a  certain  loss  in  sympa- 
thies seems  inevitable.  Yet  only  lately  did  we  not 
witness  the  inspiring  sight  of  a  great  monopoly  sur- 
rendering its  patent  in  harmless  phosphorus,  with  the 
result  that  every  excuse  for  the  use  of  the  harmful 
varieties  was  removed  from  its  rivals  ?  On  every  hand 
we  may  find  such  patience,  generosity,  and  true  un- 
worldliness  as  triumph  alike  over  the  temptations  of 
riches  and  the  buffets  of  poverty.  A  voluntary  self- 
restraint  both  in  the  use  and  the  acquisition  of  wealth 
has  a  tonic  quality,  such  as  socialism  can  never  furnish. 
For  were  there  no  prizes  to  be  striven  for,  were  worldly 
success  so  to  speak  disavowed  by  law,  how  could  we 
have  the  inspiring  spectacle  —  far  from  unknown  to- 
day, though  it  evades  publicity  —  of  those  who  refuse 
the  contest  ?  All  these  pleasant  fruits  indeed  are  fos- 
tered by  our  present  industrial  system  and  inconceiv- 
able apart  from  it.  They  may  be  rare,  —  but  they  are 
choice  in  quality.  And  shall  we  not  do  better  to  graft 
them  with  a  view  to  increase,  than  to  destroy  the  stock 
and  change  the  soil? 

Religion  after  all  has  the  whole  matter  in  her  own 
hands.  All  we  need  is  to  counteract  the  agitating  and 
insidious  teaching  of  the  social  radicals  and  yield  our- 

96 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  RELIGION 

selves  to  the  religious  appeal.  If  we  labor  patiently 
to  increase  the  spirit  of  gentleness  and  brotherliness  in 
each  individual  heart  we  shall  have  as  good  a  world  as 
we  deserve.  Convert  careless  landlords,  infuse  shame 
into  the  hearts  of  greedy  capitalists,  check  political  and 
industrial  graft,  rebuke  luxury  and  self -indulgence,  hold 
high  before  the  eyes  of  men  the  pure  vision  of  moral 
beauty,  —  and  we  can  do  no  more.  For  the  trouble  is 
not  with  the  system,  but  ,with  the  men  who  run  it, 
and  wherever  horizons  are  widened  and  Good  Will  is 
quickened  by  the  quiet  work  of  religion  any  system 
will  prove  satisfactory  enough. 

So  does  the  highest  optimism  generated  by  spiritual 
faith  turn  to  the  defense  of  the  conservative,  and  re- 
place that  gloomy  picture  of  civilization  on  which  the 
socialist  likes  to  dwell,  by  a  landscape  which  however 
defaced  by  cruel  scars  and  blackened  by  shadows  is 
none  the  less  suffused  with  passages  of  delicate  and 
lovely  light.  It  opposes  to  the  socialist  vision  of  auto- 
matic righteousness  the  warmth  and  freedom  of  the 
world  we  know,  where,  with  all  irregularities  and  cruel- 
ties, the  very  prevalence  of  selfishness  clamors  on  every 
hand  for  the  energy  of  redeeming  love,  and  rough  in- 
equalities in  condition  serve  at  once  as  spur  to  the  ar- 
dent and  discipline  to  the  humble.  With  all  the  wrongs 
our  world  can  show,  it  is  a  world  of  liberty.  Generosity, 
modesty,  energy,  sacrifice,  are  educed  by  the  very  con- 
ditions which  the  socialists  seek  to  ameliorate  or  over- 
come. Jerusalem  above,  the  mother  of  us  all,  is  our 
true  model,  —  that  free  city  wherein  spiritual  powers 

97 


THE  DILEMMA 


have  won  the  victory  of  brotherhood.  Let  us  never 
dare  to  prefer  the  promised  socialist  metropolis :  that 
Pandaemonium,  City  of  Lucifer,  well  constructed  of 
costly  materials,  within  the  bowels  of  the  earth,  and 
planned  to  exclude  by  rote  the  suffering  that  sancti- 
fies, the  temptations  that  are  the  gauge  of  freedom, 
and  the  inequalities  that  spur  while  they  sting. 

II 

Even  on  the  quiet  levels  of  everyday  life,  the  reli- 
gious critic  then  finds  the  moral  possibilities  of  a  civil- 
ization based  on  economic  incertitude  too  good  to 
forfeit.  And  probably  most  of  us  are  content  to  pause 
there,  for  the  religious  world  moves  contentedly  on 
these  levels  nowadays  for  the  most  part,  and  likes  to 
preach  "  nothing  too  much "  even  in  the  way  of  zeal, 
almost  as  well  as  the  Greeks  did. 

Yet  the  Apologist  for  Things  as  they  Are  feels  an 
impulse  to  press  further.  For  after  all,  Religion  must 
always  be  conscious  of  possible  heroisms  in  the  back- 
ground. Tenderly  solicitous  to  preserve  all  humdrum 
virtues,  she  yet  hungers  for  romance^  and  even  while 
her  lips  incite  to  fidelity  in  the  daily  task,  a  longing 
gleams  within  her  eyes  for  disciples  eager  to  follow 
those  Counsels  of  Perfection  which  have  through  all 
ages  summoned  their  own  elect. 

It  is  when  we  turn  to  these  higher  ranges  that  we 
gain  clearest  assurance  that  the  modern  palaestra  is 
one  approved  of  the  gods.  To  show  this,  we  need  only 
appeal  to  the  facts  of  history,  —  for  such  appeal  is  by 

98 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  KELIGION 

no  means  to  be  abandoned  to  the  socialists  as  their 
sole  prerogative.  In  the  long  story  that  specially  con- 
cerns us,  that  of  the  western  world  during  the  past 
two  thousand  years,  how  many  inspiring  moments,  how 
many  great  examples,  give  us  pause !  Exquisite  prod- 
ucts in  character,  all  alike  inconceivable  under  the 
socialist  order,  flash  before  our  vision.  Contemplate 
the  great  pageant  of  religious  passion  throughout  the 
ages,  especially  in  those  illumined  moments  when  the 
path  of  the  soul  has  shone  most  clear  in  the  light 
carried  by  saintly  hands.  This  joy  which  counts  the 
world  well  lost  for  spiritual  gain  is  hard  enough  to 
picture  should  that  world  no  longer  be  within  any 
man's  grasp  for  the  taking.  This  faith  born  triumphant 
out  of  experienced  injustice  could  never  shine  with  so 
fair  a  light  were  justice  the  order  of  the  day.  Limit- 
less sacrifice,  service  that  costs,  holy  recklessness  de- 
fying prudence  at  risk  of  outlawry  and  social  death, 
—  what  should  compensate  us  for  the  loss  of  these? 
And  how  may  these  blossoms  of  the  heights,  which 
flourish  only  near  the  perpetual  snows,  spring  from 
the  rich  flat  socialist  soil  ? 

On  one  reach  of  Christian  history  in  particular, 
modern  religious  thought  loves  to  dwell,  not  because 
it  is  unique,  but  rather  because  it  is  typical.  This  is 
that  Way  trodden  by  the  Poverello  of  Assisi  and  his 
companions,  singing  as  they  go  their  Canticle  of  Per- 
fect Joy, — a  music  known  only  to  those  who  renounc- 
ing have  attained,  and  as  servants  of  all  have  become 
lords  of  the  visible  world. 


THE  DILEMMA 


Contemporary  life  really  affords  few  more  curious 
symptoms  than  the  revival,  in  diverse  religious  schools, 
of  interest  in  St.  Francis.  Sometimes  this  interest  con- 
tents itself  with  the  facile  sentiment  of  the  luxurious 
traveler,  journeying  whether  literally  or  through  books 
to  the  lovely  Franciscan  shrines  of  Umbria  and  Tus- 
cany. Sometimes  it  assumes  more  scholarly  forms ;  it 
is  producing  a  varied  criticism,  and  is  rendering  a  more 
important  service  in  reprinting  the  exquisite  literature 
which  flowered  during  a  century  or  more  after  the  death 
of  the  saint.  Sometimes  —  and  when  interest  reaches 
this  stage  it  ceases  to  be  purely  a  source  of  imagina- 
tive refreshment  and  acquires  an  anguish  of  its  own 
—  it  aspires  to  renew  in  our  own  days  the  spirit  of 
the  Bridegroom  of  Poverty. 

The  full  force  of  the  Franciscan  revival  is  only 
revealed  when  this  stage  is  reached.  It  is  the  social 
idealism  of  our  time  which  turns  back,  with  so  wistful 
an  eagerness,  to  pluck  out  the  heart  of  Francis's  mys- 
tery. Other  saints  were  more  searching  theologians ; 
many  had  as  romantic  careers,  suffered  as  much,  be- 
lfcvred  as  passionately.  No  other  so  holds  the  modern 
heart.  The  ascetic  impulse  which  drove  the  finest  spirits 
to  flee  from  life  to  the  shelter  of  the  cloister  makes  little 
appeal  to  modern  men,  —  though  in  ever-new  disguises 
it  is  likely  to  reappear  as  long  as  history  shall  last. 
But  the  Little  Poor  Man  and  his  followers  did  not 
flee  from  life,  rather  they  wooed  it.  They  repudiated 
without  abandoning  that  world  which  they  lost  but  to 
find  and  serve.  And  modern  thought  finds  their  brief 

100 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  KELIGION 

episode  in  the  Christian  story  the  most  perfect  expres- 
sion since  the  first  century  of  the  social  ideals  of  the 
Gospels. 

Francis  and  his  followers  had  learned  the  divine 
wisdom :  "  Who  despises,  he  possesses :  who  desires,  is 
possessed."  The  words  of  the  ecstatic  poet  Jacopone 
da  Todi  express  the  inner  passion  which  Christianity 
from  the  days  of  the  Beatitudes  has  held  at  her 

heart : — 

Povertade  alto  sapere, 
disprezzando  possedere  4 
quanto  avvilia  il  suo  volere 
tanto  sale  in  libertade.1 

This  cult  of  poverty  sprang  from  no  ascetic  distrust 
of  natural  good,  but  from  a  passionate  recognition 
that  only  the  meek  possess  the  earth,  and  from  such 
love  of  the  brethren  as  could  only  be  contented  in 
sharing  the  lot  of  the  least. 

The  Church,  in  the  persons  of  the  excellent  Ugolino 
and  the  devoted  Elias,  broke  the  heart  of  Francis ;  at 
a  later  date,  she  dispersed  his  followers  as  heretics. 
Nevertheless,  when  she  scents  danger  from  another 
quarter,  she  is  very  likely  to  revive  their  language. 
Let  the  basis  of  her  power  be  questioned  by  a  rising 
materialism,  and  we  find  her  repeating  those  precepts 
which  in  more  ardent  days  she  had  been  the  first 

1  Poverty,  thou  wisdom  deep, 
Holding  all  possession  cheap, 
Thy  will  that  thou  fast  bound  dost  keep, 
Springs  up  in  liberty. 
From  A.  MacDonald's  paraphrase  of  the  poem  quoted  above. 

101 


THE  DILEMMA 


either  to  repudiate  or  to  damn  with  the  caution  of  her 
assent.  So  we  may  now  hear  her  reminding  the  faithful 
that  they  need  turn  to  no  disquieting  radical  doctrine 
to  soothe  their  conscience.  Sacrifice  to  the  uttermost, 
service  without  reserve,  form  an  ideal,  so  she  tells 
us ;  sufficient  to  satisfy  the  most  restless  compunction 
and  the  most  ambitious  desires  for  social  regenera- 
tion. 

Nor  is  it  official  religion  only  which  falls  back  on 
this  message.  The  most  penetrating  modern  thought 
has  rediscovered  the  wisdom  of  fools,  and  the  old  vibra- 
tions thrill  through  the  words  of  our  noblest  leaders. 
It  could  have  been  no  surprise  to  John  Ruskin  to  find 
himself  in  dreams  girt  with  the  Franciscan  cord.  That 
in  his  message  which  stands  the  test  of  time  most 
firmly  merely  reinforces  the  longing  of  the  saint  for 
personal  salvation  by  a  more  enlightened  social  com- 
punction and  enlarges  instinctive  Franciscan  feel- 
ing into  a  whole  code  of  social  action.  "  Wherever 
there  is  pressure  of  poverty  to  be  met,  all  production 
should  confine  itself  to  useful  articles."  "Live  with 
as  little  help  from  the  lower  trades  as  possible." 
"  Whatever  our  station  in  life  may  be,  those  of  us 
who  mean  to  fulfill  our  duty  ought  first  to  live  on  as 
little  as  we  can ;  second,  to  do  all  the  wholesome  work 
for  it  we  can,  and  to  spend  all  we  can  spare  in  doing 
all  the  sure  good  we  can."  The  pithy  sentences  have 
the  true  old  ring,  though  a  more  intellectual  note  is 
added  to  the  mediaeval  impulse.  True,  a  reverence  for 
manual  labor,  more  stressed  in  the  school  of  Langland 

102 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  KELIGION 

than  in  that  of  Francis,  though  not  neglected  by  the 
saint  himself,  has  enriched  the  thought  of  Ruskin; 
yet  the  fair  if  foolish  plans  of  St.  George's  Company 
would  have  appealed  mightily  to  John  of  Parma.  As 
for  Tolstoy,  Giles  and  Leo  surely  smiled  lovingly  at 
him  across  the  centuries,  and  not  least  in  his  last  sad 
days.  Save  that  in  him  that  social  motive  for  absti- 
nence which  was  only  implicit  in  the  Franciscans 
becomes  central  and  primary,  the  gospel  is  the  same ; 
and  pilgrims  who  kneel  in  August  at  the  Portiuncula 
in  Assisi  might  well  prolong  their  journey,  to  resume 
the  same  devotions  in  that  little  hut  at  Yasnaya 
Polyana,  where  the  self -exiled  prophet  of  the  nineteenth 
century  died  in  tragic  triumph. 

In  the  end  of  Tolstoy  and  of  Ruskin-,  no  less  than 
in  the  end  of  Francis,  the  tragedy  may  often  seem  to 
overtop  the  triumph.  Nevertheless,  their  teachings,  to 
a  discreet  and  moderate  measure,  are  truly  operative 
in  modern  life.  We  live  in  sensible  times  when  the 
most  flaming  ideals  must  be  softened  to  a  pleasant 
domestic  warmth  before  we  bring  them  home  to  our 
business  and  our  bosoms.  We  do  not  fling  our  gar- 
ments in  our  parents'  face  and  rush  to  the  tending  of 
lepers,  but  we  do  develop  social  service  to  a  point  of 
complexity  and  efficiency  hitherto  unknown.  We  do 
not  embrace  Lady  Poverty ;  but  a  tame  little  sister  of 
hers,  named  The  Simple  Life,  moves  demurely  among 
us,  serious  in  her  way,  though  perhaps  not  parting 
company  completely  with  Prudence  or  with  Sloth. 
She  finds  many  a  person  to  praise  her  if  but  few  to 

103 


THE  DILEMMA 


woo;  and  it  is  even  said  that  an  increasing  number 
are  seeking  her  secretly,  and  contemplating  a  union 
one  of  these  days,  —  when  family  circumstance  shall 
permit. 

Joking  aside,  it  is  in  suggestions  of  this  order,  how- 
ever cautiously  applied  and  faintly  followed,  that  we 
must  look  to-day  for  the  climax  of  the  Apologia  of 
Religion.  She  has  to  be  sure  a  certain  defense  even  on 
lower  grounds  to  offer ;  but  here,  in  the  suggestion 
that  the  way  to  absolute  sacrifice  is  always  open,  is 
the  only  ultimate  satisfaction  she  offers  to  the  ancient 
question  of  Cain.  The  high  road  is  open  as  well  as  the 
low  road ;  the  pleasant  path  of  gentleness  and  tem- 
perance in  ordinary  dealings  receives  due  religious 
sanction ;  but  see  the  more  difficult  way,  that  leads  to 
heights  crowned  with  the  Cross !  Against  the  allure- 
ments of  the  socialist  scheme,  religion  presents  a 
double  picture :  opportunity  for  a  fairly  satisfactory 
exercise  of  virtue  on  the  average  levels  for  rich  and 
poor  alike ;  and,  for  the  fiery  spirits  who  cannot  rest 
content  with  the  code  that  bears  the  Imprimatur  of 
Our  Lady  Prudence,  the  chance  to  take  social  service  for 
their  cloister  and,  valorously  defying  the  laws  of  both 
nature  and  society,  seek  the  goal  the  saints  have  won. 

Ill 

In  two  final  points,  the  attitude  of  religion  would 
seem  opposed  to  that  of  socialism. 

First,  socialism  apparently  desires  to  establish  civ- 
ilization on  a  basis  never  yet  approved  by  any  religion, 

104 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  EELIGION 

Occidental  or  Oriental,  —  for  it  proposes  to  supplant 
love  by  justice.  The  Counsels  of  Perfection  and  the 
humdrum  scheme  of  daily  life  agree  in  implying  that 
what  makes  the  world  worth  while  is  the  opportunity 
it  offers,  however  often  neglected,  for  the  free  energies 
of  good  will.  They  bid  their  votaries  scorn  the  spirit  of 
bargain  and  the  exercise  of  rights.  Again  we  turn  to 
the  Franciscans  for  a  singularly  perfect  illustration 
of  this  Christian  ideal.  See  them  discarding  all  bal- 
ance of  values,  inheriting  and  giving  all ;  begging  with 
frank  audacity,  and  receiving  gifts,  whether  of  a 
mountain  or  a  crust,  with  as  royal  a  grace  as  they 
desired  to  find  in  the  lepers  to  whom  they  ministered 
or  the  peasants  whose  vines  they  pruned  ;  heavenly 
anarchists,  to  whom  the  love  that  can  only  thrive  under 
free  skies  was  the  light  of  daily  living.  Far  enough 
their  divine  ecstasy  may  seem  from  the  routine  of 
our  every  day,  yet  our  whole  social  life  is  defensible 
only  as  it  implies  their  ideal  as  its  culmination. 

Against  this  ideal,  socialism  presents  the  image  of 
a  world  in  which  free  giving  and  uncalculating  sacri- 
fice appear  to  have  no  place :  where  human  relations 
are  regulated,  not  by  intimate  choice  and  personal 
emotion,  but  by  an  automatic  justice,  impersonal  and 
inevitable  as  gravitation.  The  religious  soul  rejects 
the  image ;  seeking  the  social  ideal  most  conducive  to 
spiritual  welfare,  and  confronted  by  what  well  may 
seem  the  self-centred  ease  and  softness  of  the  promised 
socialist  land,  it  turns  back  and  chooses  the  ancient 
battlefield,  with  all  its  blood,  with  all  its  wounds. 

105 


THE  DILEMMA 


Francis  himself  had  no  desire  to  convert  all  men  to 
his  way  ;  a  world  of  Franciscans  would  have  given  the 
Brothers  Minor  no  scope  at  all !  He  aimed  simply  to 
train  a  militia  for  the  relief  of  suffering  humanity :  the 
poor  should  always  be  present  that  they  might  be  ten- 
derly cared  for,  and  the  respectabilities  of  possession 
and  privilege  forever  flaunt  attractions  which  holy 
ecstasy  might  forever  flout. 

Religion,  since  the  secret  drama  of  the  spirit  is  the 
only  one  in  which  it  is  interested,  finds  in  our  civili- 
zation the  best  stage  it  can  imagine :  a  stage  wonder- 
fully adapted  to  give  full  play  to  freedom,  and  so  to 
further,  "through  stress  and  strain  and  battle-pain," 
the  formation  of  character,  the  development  of  person- 
ality. Only — and  here  is  the  second  final  point  of  issue 
between  our  two  attitudes  —  religion  contemplates  civ- 
ilization as  it  were  from  behind  the  scenes.  To  the 
automatically  perfect  universe  of  the  socialist,  it  op- 
poses, to  be  sure,  our  present  imperfect  world ;  but 
this  world  is  seen  from  the  point  of  view,  no  longer  of 
time  but  of  eternity.  Thus  contemplated  "  sub  specie 
seternitatis,"  every  circumstance,  trivial  or  painful 
when  viewed  in  the  usual  fashion,  acquires  new  dig- 
nity. The  story  that  we  watch  yields  its  meaning  only 
as  we  see  it  in  relation  to  that  endless,  timeless  life, 
which  is  hidden  from  scientist  and  sociologist  but  is 
the  only  reality  to  the  man  of  faith,  and  the  only 
matter  that  concerns  us. 

So  we  may  say  at  once  that  the  socialists  are  right 
in  taunting  religion  with  pre-occupation  with  the  eter- 

106 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  RELIGION 

nal ;  only  be  it  noted  that  eternity  is  construed  to-day 
in  a  new  lighfc,  and  is  no  longer  mainly  concerned 
with  a  heavenly  future :  rewards  and  punishments  to 
compensate  for  present  injustice  in  a  world  to  come 
are  rarely  suggested  by  modern  religion.  Eternity  is 
here  and  now,  and  endless  duration  is  merely  a  corol- 
lary from  the  perception  of  a  quality  in  mortal  deeds 
that  lifts  them  out  of  the  category  of  time.  It  is  this 
quality  that  Religion  cares  for  ;  and  in  the  dissatisfac- 
tions and  inequities  that  obtain  in  the  visible  world, 
she  sees  means  marvelously  calculated  to  evoke  it. 
Only  a  civilization  foundoid  on  private  property  could 
afford  such  spiritual  opportunities  as  set  men  free  from 
the  delusions  of  time,  for  the  value  of  those  opportun- 
ities consists  in  the  difficulty  of  embracing  them  and 
the  defeat  to  which  they  doom  us  on  the  natural  plane. 
When  the  socialists  fling  the  bitter  taunt  of  failure 
at  us,  Religion  retorts  with  mystic  exaltation  that  by 
failure  the  world  is  saved.  For  through  failure  and 
defeat  alone  can  we  know  ourselves  and  all  our  tran- 
sient race  to  be  heirs  of  eternity. 

With  Eternity,  current  socialism  is,  as  maybe  at  once 
confessed,  little  preoccupied.  Its  concern  is  with  time, 
and  if  the  appeal  of  Religion  fails  to  convince  our  pil- 
grim, it  is  because  the  memory  of  the  sights  of  time 
still  haunts  him.  Well  and  wondrous  the  mystery  of 
La  Verna,  —  but  what  of  the  laborer  in  the  sweat- 
shop ?  Touching  the  generosity  of  the  rare  employer 
who  protects  his  working  people  with  fatherly  care,  — 
but  myriads  of  gaunt  faces  pouring  from  factories  at 

107 


THE  DILEMMA 


eventide  rise  wanly  before  the  mind.  Lady  Poverty 
is  a  fair  if  austere  bride  to  the  pure  in  heart,  —  but 
has  she  not  other  aspects  ?  "  Time  was  I  loved  and 
wooed  her,"  says  the  social  evangelist,  Alexander  Ir- 
vine :  "  but  as  I  walked  by  her  side  and  watched  her 
works,  it  was  revealed  to  me  that  Lady  Poverty  was 
a  murderess."  Even  that  past  country,  which  looks  so 
fair  in  retrospect,  held  wide  tracts  of  desert,  where 
children  knew  no  joy  in  childhood,  where  the  life  of 
women  was  consumed  through  the  cruel  stress  of  the 
unwatered  way,  where  strong  men  by  the  thousand 
fell  enfeebled  by  burdens  they  should  never  have  been 
asked  to  bear. 

Looking  straight  at  life,  we  cannot  wonder  if  mod- 
ern schools  seek  to  eliminate  that  poverty  which 
Francis  sought  to  sanctify,  and  setting  at  defiance  the 
words  of  a  greater  than  Francis,  cry  aloud,  "  Cursed 
are  ye  poor !  "  Oppressed  by  the  fearful  human  waste 
around  us,  we  cannot  escape  the  terror  lest  we  be 
Pharisaical  aristocrats  in  the  things  of  the  Spirit,  if 
we  find  compensation  in  the  spiritual  victories  of  the 
strong  among  rich  or  poor  for  the  moral  devastations 
that  have  always  accompanied  a  social  order  founded 
in  inequalities  of  privilege.  So  long  as  there  is  sac- 
ramental unity  between  flesh  and  soul,  a  civilization 
which  drains  life  from  thousands  cannot  be  excused 
because  an  individual  here  and  there  has  strength  to 
reach  the  hidden  springs  and  to  attain  the  beauty  of 
holiness. 

Contemplating  a  world  in  which  love,  on  individ- 
108 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  KELIGION 

ualistic  lines,  has  had  its  innings  for  many  a  long  cen- 
tury, perhaps  we  should  not  be  sorry  to  see  a  chance 
given  to  Justice  after  all. 

IV 

To  which  range  of  uplands  shall  we  lift  our  eyes,  — 
that  which  rises  to  westward,  or  to  eastward  ?  Behind 
us  are  the  manifold  spiritual  achievements  of  the  past, 
most  luminously  exalted  perhaps  in  those  high  places 
where  Francis  loved  to  abide  with  his  companions, 
and  in  whose  hidden  recesses  his  humble  soul  was 
made  one  with  the  mystery  of  eternal  sacrifice.  Be- 
yond us,  so  distant  still  that  we  may  readily  mistake 
them  for  cloudland,  soar  the  ranges  of  socialism,  allur- 
ing but  untrodden  and  unknown. 

Is  there  any  other  high  country  that  invites  our 
pilgrim  feet?  One  perhaps  the  mind  descries.  It  is 
the  Pagan,  more  especially  the  Greek  ideal,  —  a  calm 
self-sufficiency,  an  intellectual  and  a3Sthetic  life  ful- 
filled in  disciplined  delights,  and  renouncing  the  goods 
of  earth  only  in  so  far  as  the  finest  personal  develop- 
ment demands  an  ascesis  of  its  own.  This  ideal  has 
had  its  advocates  in  every  age :  on  these  level  and  se- 
rene heights  many  a  great  nature  has  moved,  and  still 
calls  on  us  to  follow.  Yet  these  are  few  in  proportion 
to  the  total  number  of  those  who  seek  to  walk  in  the 
Spirit;  and  are  we  not  safe  in  saying  that  they  are 
fewer  than  ever  to-day  ?  This  tranquil  and  remote  ideal 
was  the  product  of  times  before  a  troubling  love  and 
a  compassion  that  can  know  no  rest,  had  come  to  make 

109 


THE  DILEMMA 


their  abode  with  men.  A  helot  class  made  possible  the 
,  absorption  of  the  Greek  in  beautiful  living.  His  art, 
philosophy,  poetry,  flourished  in  a  civilization  where 
the  sacrifice  of  the  many  to  the  good  of  the  nobler 
few  was  taken  as  a  matter  of  course.  But  only  those 
who  exile  the  modern  sense  of  the  Whole  from  the 
intricacies  of  consciousness  can  entertain  the  Greek 
view  of  life  to-day.  The  inveterate  instinct  of  compunc- 
tion and  brotherhood  born  when  the  angels  sang  at 
Bethlehem  is  a  force  astonishingly  potent,  say  what  we 
or  what  Nietzsche  will.  From  quite  another  point  of 
view,  moreover,  a  scientific  attitude  toward  social  evo- 
lution shows  with  reasonable  clearness  that  a  larger 
degree  of  real  democracy,  and  a  more  fluid  conception 
of  progress  than  are  compatible  with  any  reversion  to 
the  Greek  ideal,  must  be  involved  in  any  future  social 
forms. 

We  turn  away  our  eyes  therefore  from  these  Pagan 
uplands,  as  from  a  fair  region  traversed  once  but  now 
rightly  abandoned.  The  two  remaining  ranges,  toward 
one  of  which  alone  a  path  is  blazed,  wait  tempting 
our  adventure.  After  our  long  pilgrimage  from  dream 
through  experience,  a  clear  alternative  confronts  us. 
We  have  been  led  by  the  logic  of  life  from  vague 
compunction  to  the  concrete  deed,  ardent  but  casual 
and  opportunist ;  and  discontent  with  our  superficial 
energies  has  forced  us  to  the  quest  for  some  sound 
and  broad  theory  by  which  our  activities  may  be  tested 
and  guided.  Our  choice  has  narrowed  itself  to  social- 
ism on  the  one  hand,  to  that  apologia  of  the  conserv- 

110 


THE  APOLOGIA  OF  RELIGION 

ative  which  we  have  just  outlined,  on  the  other.  Is 
the  religious  answer  to  the  social  conscience  the  last 
forlorn  hope  of  a  cause  that  is  lost?  Or,  as  has  so 
often  happened  in  history,  will  it  prove  the  triumphant 
reasserfckm  against  a  new  foe,  of  that  ancient  faith 
which  its  votaries  claim  has  been  competent  to  reveal 
the  deeper  meaning  in  each  historic  development  of  the 
past  two  thousand  years,  and  to  open  victoriously  in 
each  fresh  life-sources  for  the  human  spirit? 

The  socialism  opposed  to  it  speaks  clear  and  unmis- 
takable language.  It  has  sloughed  off  the  Utopian 
sentimentalities  of  its  youth,  and  is  crystallized  and 
firm,  including  as  necessary  elements  those  doctrines 
of  economic  determinism  and  the  class-struggle  so  un- 
welcome to  the  more  languid  and  sentimental  among 
its  own  adherents.  It  takes  its  stand  on  a  realistic 
interpretation  of  history,  encourages  instincts  which 
Christianity  has  always  viewed  with  distrust  and  fear, 
and  points  to  a  social  order  which  would  place  the  free 
energies  of  love  at  a  seemingly  hopeless  discount. 

Between  the  mystic  defenders  of  the  old  order  and 
the  realistic  champions  of  the  new  stands  our  genera- 
tion ;  perplexed,  expectant ;  aware  of  a  certain  fusion 
in  process  to  unite  the  older  religious  consciousness 
and  the  new  social  creed,  yet  suspecting  this  fusion  to 
be  superficial  and  unreal,  and  dreading  to  discover,  as 
time  goes  on,  a  deadly  antagonism  between  the  two 
ideals.  It  longs  to  reach  a  reconciliation,  not  of  com- 
promise but  of  synthesis,  and  would  fain  see  the  ideals 
united,  in  a  message  that  shall  spell  both  individual 

111 


THE  DILEMMA 


and  social  salvation.  But  it  holds  back,  awestruck, 
resisting  the  first  eager  impulse  that  pressed  it  toward 
the  socialist  ranks,  fearful  lest  by  gaining  the  world 
even  for  its  brethren's  sake  it  should  lose  its  soul,  and 
theirs. 

V 

In  this  situation,  vigorous  thinking  is  a  necessity: 
the  immense  production  of  books  and  articles  is  a 
sign  that  it  is  going  on.  There  will  always  to  be  sure 
be  many  valuable  and  contented  people  to  take  a 
cheerfully  opportunist  attitude  toward  social  duty,  but 
many  others  are  temperamentally  unable  to  do  this, 
nor  can  the  world  at  large  rest  in  opportunism  in  the 
long  run.  Till  we  know  in  what  direction  to  move,  we 
are  inclined  to  stand  still.  The  choice  we  face  involves, 
as  every  important  choice  must  do,  both  a  theory  of 
social  order  and  an  ideal  of  personal  duty.  The  latter 
depends  on  the  former,  and  until  we  gain  a  right  con- 
ception of  the  aims  in  social  advance  and  the  path  to 
follow,  every  active  power  in  us  is  paralyzed  at  the 
root. 

So,  as  Matthew  Arnold  would  have  bidden  us  many 
a  year  ago,  this  book  betakes  itself  to  reflection.  And 
first,  we  must  examine  those  obnoxious  assumptions 
which  underlie  all  effective  socialist  schools  :  economic 
determinism  and  the  doctrine  of  the  class -struggle. 
For  there  is  no  use  in  proceeding  to  a  discussion  of 
personality  in  the  socialist  state  until  we  decide  whether 
socialism  permits  us  that  spiritual  view  of  the  uni- 
verse which  alone  gives  personality  any  scope. 


PART  II 
FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


PART  II.   FIRST  PRINCIPLES 
CHAPTER  I 

ECONOMIC    DETEEMINISM 


THERE  is  one  point  in  which  the  conservative  must 
agree,  whether  he  will  or  no,  with  the  socialist  conten- 
tion :  he  must  abandon  the  image  of  a  fixed  stage  for 
the  human  drama. 

The  "Divine  Comedy,"  epitome  of  the  medieval 
mind,  shows  a  pilgrim  soul  wending  his  way  through 
all  depths  and  heights  of  being.  From  the  Earthly 
Paradise  on  the  summit  of  the  Mount  of  Purgatory, 
he  is  rapt  upward  and  outward  through  the  circling 
spheres  of  which  the  earth  is  centre,  till,  beyond  the 
last  concentric  ring  of  matter,  he  gazes  on  that  Un- 
created Light  within  whose  depths  he  sees  ingathered, 
"  bound  by  love  in  one  volume,  the  scattered  leaves 
of  all  the  universe."  Through  the  whole  sweep  of 
this  environment  there  is  no  hint  of  change.  The 
universe  through  which  Dante  moves  from  the  depth 
of  Hell  to  the  Heaven  of  the  Fixed  Stars  and  the 
Primum  Mobile  can  never  alter.  To  the  poet,  his  con- 
ception was  not  only  parable  but  scientific  fact,  and 
as  he  conceived  the  system  of  Nature,  so  he  conceived 
the  historic  stage.  Civilization  must  reproduce  the 
majestic  aspect  of  eternity.  As  the  earth  clings  at  the 

115 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


centre  of  spheres  forever  returning  in  their  rhythmi- 
cal orbits,  so  the  centralized  powers  of  papacy  and 
empire  form  the  permanent  foci  around  which  rightly 
ordered  society  must  forever  move. 

It  is  one  of  the  most  marvelous  creations  ever 
formed  by  the  human  mind,  and  we  can  never  think 
it  again.  There  is  no  heaven  of  the  fixed  stars.  Those 
stellar  systems  themselves  are  rushing  through  space 
at  an  inconceivable  rate,  bearing  us  with  them  toward 
a  goal  of  which  we  know  nothing.  Our  own  planet 
may  circle  for  a  time  in  its  accustomed  orbit,  but 
meanwhile  glaciers  recede,  green  things  appear,  the 
animal  creation  passes  through  extraordinary  trans- 
formations, and  man,  from  the  date  of  his  recent  ad- 
vent, moves  through  the  centuries,  a  changing  creature 
in  a  changing  world.  As  for  eternity,  we  have  seen 
that  modern  thought  is  little  concerned  with  it ;  but 
when  we  do  try  to  escape  the  bonds  of  time,  and  to 
penetrate  behind  the  sense-world  we  know,  we  instinct- 
ively dissociate  eternity  itself  from  the  concept  of 
immobility,  and  see,  in  the  invisible  as  in  the  visible, 
no  permanence,  but  a  perpetual  Becoming. 

Civilization  is  static  no  more  than  nature:  that 
social  order  within  which  our  contemporary  drama 
must  be  played  is  no  fixed  stage  but  an  evolving  life. 
Whether  it  be  evolving  toward  socialism  or  no,  per- 
haps no  one  is  in  a  position  to  assert.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  preposterous  to  claim  that  anything  about 
us  —  our  misfortunes  or  our  prosperities,  our  social 
inequalities  or  our  respect  for  property,  our  charities 

116 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


or  our  incentives  —  is  indorsed  by  the  eternal  nature 
of  things.  "  E  pur  si  muove,"  whispers  the  obstinate 
Galileo-voice  within.  The  modern  industrial  order 
will  vanish  as  surely  as  feudalism  has  vanished,  or 
those  other  civilizations,  nomadic,  agricultural,  tribal, 
which  the  mental  eye  discerns  in  faint  retreating  per- 
spective till  it  loses  itself  in  the  abyss  of  prehistoric 
time. 

So  far  as  defending  the  old  order  is  concerned,  our 
generation  has  then  no  choice  at  all,  for  that  order 
vanishes  while  we  debate.  And  as  we  bow  before  the 
majesty  of  a  law  of  economic  change,  inexorable  as  any 
law  of  nature,  it  is  no  wonder  if  fatalism  waves  us 
toward  the  prison  of  the  materialistic  interpretation 
of  history.  Where  may  we  find  place  in  this  scheme 
of  things  for  our  ardent  purpose  and  our  shaping 
power  ?  Must  we  not  rather  turn  economic  determin- 
ists  without  more  ado,  and  yield  assent  to  those  sharp 
verses  by  Clough,  in  which  Cosmocrator,  the  Spirit 
of  this  world,  rouses  the  young  soul  from  his  dreams  ? 

This  stern  Necessity  of  things 
On  every  side  our  being  rings. 
Our  sallying  eager  actions  fall 
Vainly  against  that  iron  wall. 
Where  once  her  finger  points  the  way, 
The  wise  thinks  only  to  obey. 
Submit !  Submit ! 


'T  is  common  sense,  and  human  wit 
Can  claim  no  higher  name  than  it. 
Submit!  Submit! 

117 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


"  The  wise  thinks  only  to  obey  " ;  nevertheless,  it 
would  be  folly  to  accept  the  sweeping  dictum  of  the 
determinist  at  the  very  outset.  An  illustration  from 
history  may  serve  to  clear  our  thinking.  We  will  take 
it  from  the  period  when  preevolutionary  idealism 
was  coming  to  its  first  desperate  grapple  with  a  new 
method,  within  the  socialist  camp  itself  ;  and  it  will 
serve  to  impress  on  us  the  tremendous  recoil  occasioned 
among  the  idealists  in  early  days  by  the  scientific  and 
positive  point  of  view  in  sociology. 

II 

In  the  year  1871  an  interesting  discussion,  recorded 
in  the  pages  of  a  quaint  old  pamphlet,  was  carried 
on  between  Giuseppe  Mazzini  and  Michael  Bakunin. 
Mazzini  —  noble  old  champion,  arch -conspirator  in 
Europe  for  the  past  quarter-century,  identified  with 
all  political  audacities  and  radical  ideals  —  had  pro- 
tested in  bewilderment  and  anger  against  the  new  rad- 
icalism gathering  under  the  leadership  of  Marx.  The 
time  had  not  come  for  that  definite  break  between 
Marx  and  Bakunin  which  was  to  dissolve  the  Inter- 
national ;  and  the  future  leader  of  the  anarchist  party 
in  the  socialist  camp  was,  at  this  point,  the  chosen 
defender  of  Marxian  doctrines. 

The  scoffer  might  watch  for  a  certain  unconscious 
jealousy  to  color  the  pained  feeling  with  which  Mazzini 
saw  a  new  school  of  independent  origin  superseding 
his  influence  with  the  European  youth.  He  might  ex- 
pect the  impatient  hunger  for  novelty  of  a  rising  gen- 

118 


ECONOMIC  DETEKMINISM 


eration  to  creep  into  the  utterances  of  Bakunin.  But 
the  records  on  either  side  are  free  from  any  lower 
strain.  In  the  brilliant  Russian,  reverence  and  ten- 
derness are  evidently  unfeigned ;  and  no  one  can  fail 
to  feel  in  all  the  words  of  Mazzini  that  unfaltering 
devotion  to  the  pure  Idea  which,  whatever  lapses  his 
great  character  may  have  known,  is  the  essential  trait 
that  gives  him  place  in  the  noble  army  of  Truth's 
martyrs. 

The  point  which  he  is  defending  is  assuredly  impor- 
tant ;  it  is  no  less  than  the  sanctity  and  the  operative 
power  of  moral  passion  in  social  advance.  The  social- 
ists were  crying  in  full  pack  their  new-found  slogan, 
—  the  materialistic  interpretation  of  history.  Class- 
conscious,  revolutionary  socialism  was  in  its  vigorous 
youth  expressing  itself  more  crudely  and  uncompro- 
misingly than  to-day.  The  religious  conceptions  of  the 
past  were  bitterly  repudiated,  and  with  them  all  belief 
in  disinterested  motives  as  a  factor  in  the  actual  life  of 
the  world.  Marx's  "Capital "  had  been  out  less  than 
a  decade,  but  it  had  already  rallied  an  army  of  follow- 
ers, in  whose  minds  the  conviction  was  crystallizing 
that  the  class-interest  of  the  rising  proletariat  was  the 
only  driving  force  with  sufficient  impetus  to  count  in 
improving  social  conditions,  since  all  seemingly  moral 
impulses  were  the  product  of  an  inevitable  economic 
order. 

"  Mazzini  reproaches  us  with  not  believing  in  God !  "  cries 
Bakunin.  We  in  our  turn  reproach  him  with  believing. 
Who  is  found  under  the  banner  of  God  nowadays  ?  Napo- 

119 


FIKST  PRINCIPLES 


leon  III  to  Bismarck ;  the  Empress  Euge'nie  to  Queen  Isa- 
bella, with  the  Pope  between  them  gallantly  presenting  the 
mystic  rose  to  each  in  turn.  All  the  emperors,  all  the  kings, 
all  the  official  and  noble  world  of  Europe,  all  the  great 
teachers  of  industry,  commerce,  banking ;  all  patented  pro- 
fessors and  state  functionaries ;  all  the  police  force,  includ- 
ing the  priests,  —  those  black  policemen  of  souls  who  guard 
the  profits  of  the  state  ;  all  the  generals,  pure  defenders  of 
public  order,  and  all  editors  of  the  venal  press,  pure  repre- 
sentatives of  official  virtue.  There  is  the  army  of  God. 

And  in  the  opposite  camp  ?  Revolution !  The  audacious 
men  who  deny  God,  a  divine  order,  and  the  principle  of 
authority,  but  who  on  that  very  account  are  believers  in 
humanity,  affirmers  of  a  human  order  and  of  human  liberty. 

Discussing  the  accusation  of  materialism  brought 
against  his  school,  he  heartily  accepts  it,  but  explains 
matter  as  including  the  whole  range  of  known  phe- 
nomena. A  luminous  definition  follows :  — 

As  in  the  world  rightly  called  material,  inorganic  matter 
is  the  determining  base  of  organic,  so  in  the  social  sphere, 
which  can  only  be  considered  the  last  phase  of  the  material, 
the  advance  of  economic  forces  has  always  been,  and  is  still, 
the  determining  base  of  all  advance,  religious,  philosophic, 
political,  and  social. 

Mazzini  since  he  began  his  propaganda  has  kept  on  say- 
ing to  the  proletariat :  Moralize  yqurselves,  accept  the  moral 
law  I  teach,  and  you  will  have  glory  and  power,  prosperity, 
liberty,  and  equality. 

Socialism  says  on  the  contrary  that  the  economic  slavery 
of  the  worker  is  the  source  of  all  his  servitude,  and  of  all 
social  misery ;  and  that  therefore  economic  emancipation  of 
the  working  classes  is  the  primary  end  of  all  social  agitation. 

120 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


So,  with  hard  clang  of  word  on  word,  with  infinite 
relish  and  the  ardor  of  a  great  consecration,  Bakunin 
puts  the  central  thought  which  he  and  his  comrades 
were  presenting  to  the  working  classes  of  Europe,  and 
which,  ever  since  the  "  Communist  Manifesto,"  had 
been  working  like  a  ferment  in  their  minds. 

With  certain  points  in  this  thought  Mazzini  must 
have  sympathized.  His  had  been  the  chief  voice  to 
appeal  to  workingmen  as  the  leaders  of  the  future. 
He  had  deplored  and  denounced  "  that  deep  social  in- 
equality that  insults  the  Cross  of  Christ."  "  It  is  clear 
that  you  ought  to  labor  less  and  to  gain  more  than 
you  do  now,"  he  said  to  the  workingmen.  "  The  remedy 
for  your  suffering  is  to  be  found  in  the  union  of  labor 
and  capital  in  the  same  hands.  You  were  once  slaves, 
then  serfs,  then  hirelings.  You  need  but  to  will  it, 
in  order  shortly  to  become  free  producers  and  brothers 
through  association." 

If  the  writer  of  words  like  these  viewed  the  rising 
movement  to  rouse  the  proletariat  as  an  early  Christ- 
ian might  have  viewed  Antichrist,  the  reason  must 
be  sought  in  the  materialistic  trend  of  the  words  of 
Bakunin. 

Neither  opponent  converted  the  other,  for  they 
represented  contrary  assumptions :  on  the  one  hand, 
the  deliberate  theory,  shocking  then,  familiar  to-day, 
that  the  economic  system  is  the  "  base  "  of  all  moral 
and  spiritual  passion ;  on  the  other,  the  diametrically 
opposed  assertion  that  —  in  Wordsworth's  phrase  — 
"  by  the  soul  only  the  nations  shall  be  great  and  free  " ; 

121 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


that  "all  material  progress,"  to  use  Mazzini's  own 
words,  "  is  the  infallible  result  of  moral  progress." 

Were  the  controversy  finished,  our  interest  in  it 
would  be  purely  academic.  But  it  is  not.  During  the 
forty  years  since  its  occurrence  the  two  attitudes,  here 
crisply  presented  by  picturesque  opponents,  have  been 
struggling  to  win  control.  Year  by  year  the  struggle 
intensifies ;  under  our  eyes  the  adversaries  are  closing 
for  what  may  well  be  the  final  grapple.  To  refuse  to 
face  the  issue  is  to  lose  our  chance  to  play  a  part  in 
the  most  far-reaching  and  practical  controversy  which 
the  twentieth  century  is  called  upon  to  settle. 

As  we  look  back,  one  fact  must  strike  us.  Mazzini 
lived  and  died  alone ;  gathering  around  him,  indeed, 
during  his  lifetime  many  a  disciple,  by  virtue  of  his 
exalted  ideas  and  magnetic  personality,  but  founding 
no  fruitful  tradition.  His  reader  to-day  is  baffled  and 
saddened  by  the  mingling  of  philosophic  breadth  with 
much  that  is  arrogant  and  fantastic,  —  the  product 
of  an  arbitrary  mind  that  imposes  its  own  inventions 
on  the  universe.  In  Mazzini's  eloquent,  broken,  tin- 
gling prose,  intuitions  startlingly  creative  and  justified 
by  time,  concerning  the  necessity  of  supplanting  a 
political  by  social  and  industrial  conception  of  demo- 
cracy, jostle  wild  notions  concerning  the  mystic  destiny 
of  Rome,  and  false  classifications  of  historical  ages 
after  the  style  of  Saint-Simon  or  Comte.  We  are  deal- 
ing with  a  glorious  nature  in  unstable  equilibrium, 
which  treads  too  often,  not  the  terra  firma  of  the  act- 
ual, but  a  tight-rope  gossamer,  spun  spider-like  from 

128 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


within.  Here  is  a  great  man ;  here  is  no  founder  of  a 
great  or  living  school. 

And  we  have  already  had  occasion  to  notice  that 
Mazzini's  opponents  have  succeeded  where  he  failed. 
Over-great  reliance  on  his  own  mind  led  this  noble 
genius,  consecrated  to  the  service  of  the  People,  astray 
into  a  vaporous  region  where  he  too  often  mistook  the 
mirage  of  glories  long  left  behind  for  a  smiling  land 
of  promise.  Marx,  on  the  other  hand,  a  nature  far  less 
sympathetic,  deduced  from  his  keen  scrutiny  of  the 
actual  sweep  of  economic  history  a  synthetic  concep- 
tion of  the  laws  governing  social  advance,  which, 
whether  or  no  it  end  by  commending  itself,  colors 
to-day  every  contribution  to  social  thought.  He  and  his 
followers  have  fait  ecole.  We  may  not  say  that  this 
is  due  to  superior  method  in  organization :  Mazzini 
too  organized  inveterately  from  youth  to  age.  In  the 
avowedly  scientific  analysis  of  Marx  and  his  succes- 
sors there  has  proved  to  be  something  more  vitally 
competent  to  hold  men  together  than  in  the  pure 
moral  ideals  of  Mazzini. 

But  if  in  one  sense  Bakunin  and  his  colleagues  had 
the  future  on  their  side,  we  may  not  say  that  the  ex- 
ponents of  idealism  are  routed.  True,  they  have  failed 
to  satisfy  us  ;  but  we  cannot  forget  them.  The  accents 
of  Carlyle,  of  Victor  Hugo,  of  Kuskin,  of  Tolstoy, 
still  echo  down  the  decades.  Matthew  Arnold's  sharp, 
concise  warning  is  still  in  order.  "  Moral  causes  govern 
the  standing  and  the  falling  of  men  and  nations.  They 
save  or  destroy  them  by  a  silent,  inexorable  fatality." 

123 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


The  Church  reiterates  a  similar  conviction  as  a  platitude 
which  she  does  not  even  stop  to  prove.  Still,  passing 
from  the  fertile  literature  of  the  theologian,  philoso- 
pher, poet,  to  the  arid  books  of  the  socialists,  one  is 
shocked  by  a  change  of  atmosphere  as  sudden  as  that 
encountered  by  the  traveler  from  the  plains  of  Lom- 
bardy  to  the  Alpine  heights.  It  is  noteworthy  that  the 
latter  school,  whether  it  speak  through  popular  organs 
like  "  The  Clarion,"  or  the  New  York  «  Call,"  through 
the  moderate  voice  of  Mr.  Hillquit  or  the  powerful 
intellects  of  Europeans  like  Kautsky  or  Jaures,  makes 
its  appeal  to  the  workers,  expressing  not  indeed  a 
majority,  but  an  intensely  convinced  minority,  of  that 
vast  proletariat.  One  fears,  on  the  other  hand,  that 
Matthew  Arnold  and  the  theologians  are  perused  by 
the  privileged  alone ;  and  the  conviction  is  forced  upon 
one  that  in  the  midst  of  a  remarkable  and  growing  uni- 
formity as  to  the  need  of  deep  social  change,  a  radical 
cleavage  as  to  fundamental  diagnosis  and  practical 
method  of  attack  tends  roughly  to  correspond  to  the 
cleavage  between  classes. 

Will  the  idealists,  with  their  balance  of  fine  feeling 
and  cultured  instincts,  and  the  age-long  tradition  be- 
hind them,  win  the  day  and  rout  the  determinist  ?  Or 
will  the  latter  gain  his  somewhat  tragic  triumph,  and 
manifest  in  the  highest  psychical  activity  of  the  world 
only  a  blossoming  lovely  to  see  but  useless  for  practi- 
cal purposes? 

The  questions  involved  cut  deep.  If  the  Marxian 
extremist  be  right,  the  call  to  sacrifice  and  service 

124 


ECONOMIC  DETEEMINISM 


which  rings  clear  in  increasing  volume  through  the 
modern  world  is  delusion.  The  change  implied  in  the 
necessary  progress  of  economic  evolution  is  destined 
by  itself  to  destroy  classes,  and  to  insure  a  general 
welfare  based  on  the  elimination  of  wealth-producing 
property  from  the  range  of  private  ownership.  The 
only  effective  aid  we  can  render  is  to  educate  the 
thought  and  quicken  the  passions  of  the  working  class, 
thus  hastening  the  process  by  which  the  great  result 
must  be  achieved. 

But  in  the  eyes  of  the  older  idealist,  the  Paradise 
which  these  thinkers  hold  out  is  a  fool's  Paradise  in- 
deed. And  let  us  confess  at  the  outset  that  it  would 
be  an  evil  day  when  the  cruder  socialist  view  should 
triumph:  a  day  when  the  deepest  intuitions  won  by  the 
travail  of  the  past  must  be  lightly  tossed  on  the  waste- 
heap,  and  the  feet  of  humanity  set  in  a  grim  new  path, 
looking  toward  an  unillumined  future. 

Many  a  man  will  instinctively  adhere  to  one  or 
the  other  school,  dub  the  other  folly  or  knavery,  and 
rest  content.  But  there  are  others  who  feel  that  no 
doctrine  was  ever  believed  by  a  number  of  men  with- 
out having  some  value.  To  such,  the  effort  to  find  the 
abiding  truth  in  opposed  attitudes  seems  not  only 
an  entertaining  but  a  fruitful  pursuit.  The  moments 
when  two  ideas,  thought  to  be  irreconcilable,  are  per- 
ceived to  be  supplementary,  are  the  most  radiant  in 
one's  inner  history.  Let  the  hope  of  gaining  even  a 
glimpse  of  such  a  reconciling  light  incite  us  to  our 
quest. 

125 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


III 

The  "  scientific  socialism  "  proclaimed  with  so  defi- 
ant a  fanfare  of  materialism  by  Bakunin  is,  of  course, 
only  one  phase  of  the  revolutionary  movement  which 
crystallized  in  the  last  century.  It  gave  the  social  applica- 
tion to  that  emphasis  on  life  as  ascending  from  below 
instead  of  descending  from  above,  which  was  already 
dazing  and  distressing  men  in  other  fields.  As  early 
as  1830  Carlyle  had  quoted  with  scorn  not  untouched 
by  fear  the  pregnant  phrase,  "The  brain  secretes 
thought  as  the  liver  secretes  bile,"  and  the  transform- 
ation of  psychology  was  under  weigh.  While  Baku- 
nin and  Mazzini  contended,  "  Darwinism  "  was  holding 
theology  at  the  bar.  The  Marxians  may  have  blundered 
badly  in  analyses  and  conclusions,  but  so  far  as  at- 
titude went  they  simply  transferred  the  philosophy 
fighting  all  along  the  line  to  a  new  department,  and  in 
so  doing  completed  the  alarmist  cycle  which  confronted 
thought  at  every  point  with  an  evolving  universe,  ruled 
rather  through  inevitable  law  than  through  sporadic 
activity  on  the  part  of  God  or  man. 

The  dogged  struggle  in  which  theology  and  psycho- 
logy both  yielded  the  field  was  the  chief  intellectual 
achievement  of  the  last  century.  But  in  sociology,  the 
fight  begun  in  the  days  of  Mazzini  is  not  yet  over ; 
and  the  Marxian  will  tell  you  that  the  victory  of  what 
he  is  pleased  to  call  "  historical  materialism  "  is  to  be 
the  feat  of  the  twentieth  century.  Like  the  hero  of 
TourgeniefFs  "  Fathers  and  Sons "  he  will  cheerily 

126 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


announce  that  the  distaste  of  the  classes  fed  on  ideals 
of  social  chivalry  for  this  gospel  of  the  disinherited,  is 
the  last  recoil  of  bigotry  and  superstition  from  a  posi- 
tive and  enlightened  view  of  life. 

We  hesitate  to  accept  his  plausible  contention.  In 
regard  to  the  physical  universe,  we  are  willing  to  re- 
gard man  as  a  product,  and  we  may  even  grant  that 
theology  has  lost  to  win  in  assenting  to  the  spectacle 
of  evolution.  But  the  situation  alters  when  our  vision 
shifts  from  nature  to  civilization,  for  here  is  our  own 
domain.  Man  is  the  child  of  nature, — but  he  is  the 
creator  of  society :  shall  he  abdicate  his  control,  and 
accept  the  docile  role  of  slave  to  a  "  determining  eco- 
nomic base"?  We  are  reluctant  to  think  so,  and 
idealism  clings  with  tenacity  to  what  may  well  seem 
the  last  stronghold,  the  jealously  guarded  sanctuary  of 
our  freedom.  All  the  myriad  forms  of  the  universe 
below  us  may  be  passively  evolved  in  their  successive 
phases ;  but  as  soon  as  man  enters  the  scene,  he  intro- 
duces a  new  factor  into  the  situation.  He  is  not  only 
a  necessary  product  but  a  conscious  cause,  and  exerts 
in  his  turn  a  shaping  influence  over  the  very  mate- 
rial conditions  that  have  produced  him.  And  we  are 
aware  that  the  comfort  of  the  entire  race  could  not 
repay  the  loss  of  that  light  of  effective  purpose  which, 
if  extinguished,  would  leave  a  universe  in  gloom. 

Not  preference  nor  prepossession,  but  the  steady  scru- 
tiny of  facts,  must  align  us.  To  such  scrutiny,  socialism 
summons,  and  if  we  enter  its  camp  and  see  through 
its  eyes,  we  shall  hardly  avoid  at  least  a  partial  assent 

127 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


to  its  theories.  For  the  further  we  press  analysis,  the 
more  does  individual  freedom  recede,  and  to  find  the 
origin  either  of  characters  or  of  crises  we  are  habitu- 
ally driven  back  upon  the  economic  factor. 

The  older  attitude,  which  treated  the  passions  of 
princes  as  the  significant  force  in  history,  has  long 
been  left  behind :  we  have  almost  equally  outgrown 
the  school  of  transition,  which  with  Carlyle  found 
such  force  mainly  in  the  personalities  of  strong  men. 
We  cannot  even  agree  wholly  with  later  writers,  who 
seek  the  chief  spur  to  progress  in  collective  passions 
and  desires,  —  not  at  least  till  we  recognize  to  how 
amazing  a  degree  these  passions  are  generated  in  so- 
cial conditions,  and  determined  by  the  imperious  pres- 
sure of  economic  exigencies. 

At  the  time  of  the  centenary  of  Lincoln  and  Dar- 
win a  New  York  paper  had  some  pertinent  comments, 
prefaced  by  a  reverent  tribute  to  the  two  heroes :  — 

Nothing  can  be  more  certain  to  the  thoughtful  student 
of  history  than  that  even  if  these  two  individuals  had  died 
in  their  infancy  the  course  of  events  would  have  been  essen- 
tially the  same.  Had  Seward  or  Chase  been  elected  to  the 
presidency,  the  South  would  have  seceded  just  the  same ; 
the  national  government  would  have  been  forced  to  use  its 
power ;  it  would  have  triumphed  just  the  same  because  it 
had  a  more  efficient  economic  system  as  well  as  a  stronger 
moral  incentive  on  its  side ;  and  it  would  have  been  com- 
pelled, whether  it  liked  or  not,  to  use  its  powers  to  do  away 
with  chattel  slavery.  .  .  .  Had  Darwin  not  lived  to  maturity, 
or  had  he  turned  his  powers  in  other  directions,  the  illum- 
inating and  revolutionizing  idea  of  the  origin  of  species 

128 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


and  the  survival  of  the  fittest  would  have  been  developed 
and  accepted  almost  if  not  quite  as  soon,  and  in  much  the 
same  form. 

Individuals  are  of  immense  importance  ;  but  things 
are  done  through,  not  by  them.  Look  at  history  with 
open  eyes :  do  we  not  seek  in  vain  for  men  who  have 
achieved  anything  permanent,  unless  as  they  worked 
in  harmony  with  a  larger  movement  of  which  they 
were  probably  but  half  aware  ?  The  effort  to  impose 
a  personal  view  on  the  world  fails  as  completely  as 
that  to  revive  a  dying  tradition.  How  melancholy, 
how  disconcerting,  is  that  perception  we  reached  of 
the  waste  involved  in  the  long  story  of  social  idealism, 
from  the  days  of  Plato,  master  of  the  dreamers  to  fol- 
low !  During  the  last  hundred  years,  ideals  of  social 
regeneration  have  steadily  multiplied ;  they  have  ex- 
pressed themselves  with  exquisite  beauty  in  letters, 
with  sacrificial  passion  in  life.  They  have  inspired  the 
dreams  and  dominated  the  actions  of  all  whom  the  mod- 
ern world  can  claim  as  spiritual  leaders.  And  when 
we  turned  to  them  for  guidance,  they  had  nothing  but 
disappointment  to  offer. 

The  explanation  for  this  disappointment  now  begins 
to  dawn  on  us.  Our  idealists  are  too  often  ideologists. 
Heirs  of  preevolutionary  sociology,  reluctant  to  accept 
democracy,  they  endeavored,  as  Carlyle  might  have 
said,  to  view  the  universe  as  it  is  not.  Moreover,  they 
have  overestimated  their  own  importance :  for  they 
have  expected  to  discover  the  solution  for  social  ills, 
not  from  watching  the  actual  facts  of  progress  on  this 

129 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


life-giving  even  if  unsatisfactory  earth,  but  from  anx- 
ious personal  theorizing.  Theirs  is  a  gallant  fallacy; 
but  it  is  subtly  aristocratic  and  full  of  spiritual  pride. 

Slow  indeed  has  been  the  process  by  which  idealism 
has  been  liberated  from  its  dreams.  Down  the  ages 
from  the  time  of  Plato,  the  deductive  and  personal 
method  has  held  sway.  To  a  salutary  breath  of  reality, 
which  begins  intermittently  to  blow  through  the  great 
nineteenth  -  century  writers,  is  due  whatever  power 
and  value  their  appeal  may  have ;  but  their  use  of  the 
positive  method  was  at  best  half-hearted  and  sporadic. 
In  the  main,  they  were  convinced  that  it  was  incum- 
bent on  them  to  invent  the  right  plan  for  managing 
the  universe ;  in  so  deeming,  nay,  further,  in  claim- 
ing that  no  gain  was  worthy  save  such  as  the  soul 
directly  inspired  and  decreed,  they  turned  from  the 
method  of  progress  imposed  by  Nature  herself.  The 
sentence  passed  on  them  is  their  failure  to  convince, 
to  illuminate,  or  to  guide. 

In  this  light,  how  easy  it  becomes,  for  instance,  to 
understand  the  failure  of  the  work  of  Ruskin  !  Full 
appreciation  has  never  yet  been  given  to  this  greatest 
of  the  Victorian  idealists ;  yet  his  wisdom  mingles  re- 
peatedly with  obstinate  theories  which  the  advance  of 
the  race  must  quietly  lay  aside.  "  Fors  Clavjgera  "  and 
"  Unto  this  Last "  are  weak  in  the  underpinning.  Rus- 
kin's  sensitive  intelligence  wavers,  to  be  sure,  between 
fact  and  dream.  At  times  he  discerns  reality  with 
singular  clearness  ;  at  others  he  is  capable  of  seriously 
picturing  a  class  of  benevolent  landowners  living  in 

130 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


poverty  and  devoting  themselves  to  the  interests  of  a 
docile  peasantry  occupied  with  handicraft.  Even  the 
best  in  him,  his  stirring  appeal  to  the  conscience  of 
the  privileged,  takes  scant  account  of  actual  class- 
psychology,  —  and  "  the  most  analytical  mind  in  Eu- 
rope," as  Mazzini  not  untruly  called  it,  gets  persist- 
ently off  the  track  because  it  never  gives  itself  to  the 
study  of  what,  in  the  social  organism,  happens  really 
to  occur.  His  followers  are  left  in  a  perpetual  impasse 
wistfully  admiring,  seeking  blindly  to  follow.  Is  it  not 
the  same  with  the  whole  appeal  to  social  chivalry  in 
which  was  focused  the  imaginative  and  ethical  pas- 
sion of  the  noblest  nineteenth  -  century  writers,  — 
whether  in  France,  Italy,  Germany,  Russia,  England,  or 
the  United  States?  If  we  consider  the  matter  bravely, 
apart  from  all  delight  in  eloquent  phrasing  or  fine 
feeling,  if  we  abandon  the  love  of  good  literature  for 
that  practical  point  of  view  which  these  men  all  sweat 
blood  to  press  v  upon  us,  are  we  not  obliged  to  recog- 
nize that  between  their  ideal  teaching  and  the  main 
lines  of  social  and  economic  progress  the  connection  is 
cut,  the  wires  are  down  ? 

What  is  true  of  literature  holds  also  in  the  brave 
helpless  experiments  of  philanthropy  and  reform.  These 
multitudinmis  works  are  inspired  in  the  main  by  moral 
passion  and  social  compunction  of  the  purest.  But  the 
plain  fact  is  that  they  have  the  feebleness  of  reflex 
action.  They  spring,  not  from  life  itself,  but  from  the 
pitying  contemplation  of  life,  which  is  a  very  different 
thing.  They  inspire  reverence,  they  even  play  an  essen- 

131 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


tial  minor  part  in  modern  life ;  but  we  can  never  look 
to  them,  for  adequate  social  regeneration. 

Take  the  working  girl,  for  example,  and  gather  up 
in  imagination  the  total  effect  of  all  the  benevolent 
agencies  which  exist  to  help  her:  the  girls'  club,  the 
settlement,  the  vacation  house,  the  Associated  Chari- 
ties, if  worst  comes  to  worst,  and  even  the  Woman's 
Trade-union  League.  Measure  the  force  of  their  reac- 
tion on  her  personality  in  comparison  with  that  of  two 
crude  economic  facts,  —  the  wage  she  receives  and  the 
duration  of  her  working  day.  The  worth  of  our  eager 
efforts  dwindles  both  comically  and  tragically  in  our 
eyes,  and  the  broad  economic  condition  bulks  out  of 
all  proportion  as  the  real  master  of  that  woman's  life. 
On  the  surface,  our  sympathies  may  tinker  away  pleas- 
antly and  our  charities  may  afford  relief :  in  the  depths, 
her  life  will  never  be  affected  till  the  economic  factor 
be  altered.  Widen  the  vision,  look  through  history ; 
where  can  we  point  to  social  sacrifice  or  service  on  a 
scale  sufficiently  large  radically  to  alter  the  course  of 
events  ?  The  answer  may  be  painful ;  let  it  at  least  be 
honest.  The  deep,  the  basal,  the  creative  forces,  have 
in  nine  times  out  of  ten  been  rooted  in  the  economic 
principles  of  self-interest  or  class-expediency.  Through 
the  indomitable  pressure  of  life  itself,  craving  for  sat- 
isfaction and  expansion,  and  in  no  other  wise,  effective 
advance  has  been  achieved. 

Thus  we  are  forced  however  reluctantly  to  side  with 
Bakunin  and  face  the  truth.  Economic  necessity  is  the 
determining  base  of  permanent  social  change.  The 

132 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


appeal  to  moral  incentive  can  accomplish  splendid 
work  in  detail ;  it  can  bring  blessed  help  to  unnum- 
bered individuals,  comforting,  inspiring,  and  achieving 
once  in  a  while  under  the  most  depressing  economic 
circumstances  miracles  of  rehabilitation,  practical  and 
spiritual.  But  unaided,  it  is  in  the  main  helpless  to 
compass  that  decent  society  we  crave,  and  which  to  our 
shame  two  thousand  years  of  Christianity  have  failed 
to  realize. 

Turn  now  to  the  socialists:  and  in  proportion  to 
our  disappointment  in  the  futility  of  idealism,  savor 
the  exhilaration  with  which  we  find  among  them  firm 
ground  for  the  foot  and  clear  distance  for  the  eye. 
Tolstoy,  Ruskin,  Ibsen,  were  all  on  the  wrong  tack. 
Close  these  authors ;  open  your  Engels,  your  Bebel, 
your  Jaures  ;  and,  even  though  you  may  not  agree  with 
their  doctrines,  enjoy  to  the  full  the  relief  afforded  by 
their  method  and  attitude.  For  here  at  last  we  meet 
minds  free  from  sentimentality  or  personal  obsessions, 
seeking  eagerly  to  be  at  grip  with  the  actual  facts  of 
human  progress.  The  situation  calls,  not  for  theorists 
who  seek  to  impose  gracious  ideals  upon  a  stubborn 
world,  but  for  scientific  observers,  who  can  reveal  and 
thereby  expedite  a  natural  process. 

As  we  read  them  it  becomes  perfectly  clear  why 
socialist  propaganda  swept  forward  swiftly  as  a  torrent 
which  has  found  its  true  channel  when  the  vaporous 
socialist  schemes  which  had  floated  so  long  in  space 
were  reinforced  and  precipitated  as  it  were  by  eco- 
nomic determinism.  We  cease  to  wonder*  that  the 

133 


FIKST  PRINCIPLES 


great  socialist  and  labor  parties  of  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury are  attaining  results  beside  which  all  the  radiant 
idealism  and  the  fastidiously  chosen  social  service  of 
the  privileged  classes  sinks  into  insignificance.  For 
we  are  ready  to  accept  with  these  parties  the  severe 
principle  that  social  progress,  like  natural,  is  rooted 
not  in  personal  choice  but  in  the  necessities  of  law. 

But  have  we  here,  in  any  strict  sense,  "historic 
materialism  "  ?  Or  rather,  that  old  story  which  we  are 
so  slow  to  learn,  —  that  the  sanctuary  of  life  is  in  the 
heart  of  natural  fact,  not  remote  in  distant  heavens  ? 
The  attitude  on  which  we  have  been  dwelling  asserts 
that  those  forces  which  for  sweep  and  mass  count  the 
most  in  progress  are  not  generated  apart  from  the 
common  experience,  in  the  heart  or  conscience  of  the 
exceptional  individual,  but  out  of  the  very  conditions 
of  life  itself.  The  determinist  has  perceived,  what  the 
idealist  has  too  often  ignored,  that  the  most  effective 
type  of  spiritual  power  always  arises  as  the  natural 
product  of  a  concrete  situation. 

All  history  shows  us  the  truth  of  this  principle. 
Moral  forces,  if  fruitful,  are  not  static;  they  are  re- 
lated to  the  economic  necessities  of  their  respective  pe- 
riods. Obedience,  for  instance,  so  inoperative  to-day, 
was  rightly  the  chief  virtue  of  mediaeval  society.  Reac- 
tionary virtues  existed ;  they  always  exist.  Men  died 
unseasonably,  and  all  but  uselessly,  for  freedom ;  but 
the  men  who  were  on  the  right  side  were  those  who 
accepted  the  necessity  of  authority  and  found  in  obe- 
dience the  path  of  life.  There  are  always  inconvenient 

134 


ECONOMIC  DETEKMINISM 


persons  who  wish  to  stress  a  virtue  at  the  wrong  time, 
but  their  efforts,  though  picturesque,  are  barren.  The 
valuable  people  are  those  docile  in  the  school  of  life, 
yet  sufficiently  sensitive  to  ideals  to  discern  and  aid 
the  trend  of  their  own  times  in  its  noblest  aspects. 
Let  Dante  rightly  bear  high  though  late  witness  to 
the  need  of  centralized  authority;  while  Thomas  Jef- 
ferson, also  rightly,  stands  for  the  widest  decentral- 
ization of  power.  Let  Mohammed  stress  the  glory  of 
military  force  as  a  religious  discipline,  to  the  immense 
gain  of  the  Orient  of  his  time ;  while  the  Pilgrim  Fa- 
thers make  their  stern  way  across  the  sea,  pioneers, 
however  inconsistent,  of  a  civilization  founded  on  reli- 
gious liberty. 

The  most  stirring  times  are  of  course  those  of  tran-1 
sition,  when  it  is  hardest  to  distinguish  the  notes  or 
living  forces  from  the  notes  of  the  passing  age.  Mis-! 
taken  loyalties  to  causes  of  extinguished  glory  trail1 
their  mournful  light  across  the  pages  of  history,  as ' 
the  rays  of  dead  stars  wander  forever  through  space. 
Who  would  dare  so  to  pry  into  the  secret  of  law  as 
to  say  that  they  are  wasted  utterly,  —  who  refuse  to 
their  adherents  a  place  among  those  remembered  and 
beloved?  But  he  is  the  strong  man,  the  wise  man,  the 
leader  of  power,  whose  humility  in  the  presence  of 
facts  has  bestowed  on  him  the  gift  to  read  the  mind  of 
his  age  aright  and  to  cooperate  with  its  true  purpose. 

No  one  could  put  the  case  better  than  Professor 
Commons.  He  writes,  in  his  "  Documentary  History 
of  Labor  in  the  United  States  " :  — 

135 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


We  hear  much  to-day  of  the  economic  interpretation  of 
history.  Human  life  is  viewed  as  a  struggle  to  get  a  liv- 
ing and  get  rich.  The  selfishness  of  men  hustling  for  food, 
clothing,  shelter,  and  wealth  determines  their  religion, 
their  politics,  their  form  of  government,  their  family  life, 
their  ideals.  Thus  economic  evolution  produces  religious, 
political,  domestic,  philosophical  evolution.  All  this  we  may 
partly  concede.  But  certainly  there  is  something  more  in 
history  than  a  blind  surge.  Men  act  together  because  they 
see  together  and  believe  together.  An  inspiring  ideal,  as 
well  as  the  next  meal,  makes  history.  It  is  when  such  an 
id£aJL_florre&ponds  with  a.  stage  in  pp.nnnmif*  eimlnt.ion,  and 
the  two  corroborate  each  other,  that  the  mass  of  men  begin 
to  move.  The  crystals  then  begin  to  form,  evolution  quickens 
into  revolution ;  history  reaches  one  of  its  crises.  •  .  . 
The  great  man  is  the  man  in  whose  brain  the  struggling 
ideas  of  the  age  fight  for  supremacy,  until  the  survivors 
come  out  adapted  to  the  economic  struggle  of  the  times. 

IV 

Economic  determinism,  or  the  eager  appeal  to  social 
realities  for  guidance,  led  socialism  at  once  to  the  sis- 
ter doctrine  of  the  class-struggle.  It. involved  "that 
view  of  history,"  to  quote  from  Engels,  "  which  seeks 
the  ultimate  cause  and  the  great  moving  power  of  all 
important  events  in  the  changes  in  the  mode  of  pro- 
duction and  exchange,  in  the  consequent  division  of 
society  into  distinct  classes,  and  in  the  struggle  of  these 
classes  against  one  another." 

One  need  be  no  specialist  in  sociology  to  discern 
the  chief  "  note  "  of  social  change  during  the  modern 
epoch.  The  main  economic  phenomenon  of  the  nine- 

136 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


teenth  century  was  the  rise  of  the  great  working  class, 
joint  product  of  the  political  and  of  the  industrial 
revolution.  The  main  fact  of  the  twentieth  century  is 
bound  to  be  the  advance  of  this  class  into  conscious 
power.  As  democracy  extends  from  the  political  sphere 
in  which  it  made  its  first  tentative  way,  and  reaches 
out  for  an  industrial  and  ultimately  for  a  social  appli- 
cation, this  vast  class  must  in  the  nature  of  things 
develop  a  psychology  distinctive  as  that  of  the  priest 
or  of  the  feudal  baron.  From  its  rising  protest  against 
its  conditions  must  spring  the  great  driving  force  in 
social  change.  We  may  like  the  fact  or  dislike  it :  our 
liking  or  disliking  matters  not  one  whit.  In  vain  we 
stand  apart,  arrogating  to  ourselves  a  judicial  attitude. 
Class-consciousness  is  growing  with  fierce  rapidity  from 
the  soil  of  our  economic  order ;  one  of  those  living 
forces,  necessary  products,  which  have  a  majesty  allied 
to  the  movement  of  tides  or  planets.  If  the  only  sound 
basis  of  social  action  be  the  study  of  the  forces  natu- 
rally engendered  by  economic  progress,  the  great  blun- 
der of  modern  philanthropy,  and  too  often  of  modern 
reform,  is  the  frequent  failure  to  enter  the  psychical 
life  of  the  people  whose  conditions  we  seek  to  improve. 
The  new  class  is  evoked  ;  the  role  it  has  to  play  is  not 
yet  fully  accepted,  but  that  role  will  be  a  determining 
one.  This  is  a  stern  saying,  but  "  God  wills  it,"  as  the 
old  cry  ran. 

And  there  is  truth  in  the  ancient  riddle,  that  out  of 
the  strong  comes  forth  sweetness.  In  this  advance 
of  the  workers,  moral  forces  are  sure  to  play  a  part. 

137 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


The  discomfiture  of  the  idealist,  at  least  on  the  prac- 
tical levels  of  life,  is  only  apparent ;  and  responsibility 
is  no  illusion.  Moral  forces,  like  physical,  are  out  of 
our  power  to  create,  and  refusal  to  recognize  our  help- 
lessness is  responsible  for  our  chief  blunders.  But, 
like  the  physical,  they  are  within  our  power  to  con- 
trol, direct,  and  transform :  and  in  this  fact  lies  the 
justification  for  that  hesitant  instinct  which,  when  it  con- 
fronts scientific  determinism  in  the  sociological  sphere, 
feels  more  strongly  impelled  than  ever  before  to  stress 
the  reality  of  freedom.  Man's  function  on  this  planet 
is  not  to  make,  but  to  reshape.  The  strictest  Marxian 
is  no  fatalist  in  practice ;  every  word  of  his  propa- 
ganda is  a  tribute  to  the  free  power  of  moral  passion. 
He  differs  from  the  ideologist  simply  in  perceiving 
that  the  forces  to  which  he  can  make  most  effective 
appeal  are  those  confusedly  presented  to  him  by  the 
Great  Master,  Life.  In  his  turn,  he  too  often  ignores 
the  important  fact  that  it  is  within  our  province  not 
only  to  accelerate,  but  to  modify  a  process.  Wise  men 
do  not  destroy  their  natural  impulses ;  they  moralize 
them.  The  advance  of  the  People  is  as  truly  a  natural 
product  as  the  passion  for  reproducing  the  species. 
That  too  may  be  left  a  natural  rage,  or  it  may  be 
transfigured  till  it  shines  with  a  light  from  Heaven  in 
the  eyes  of  consecrated  motherhood.  The  Magdalen 
became  the  woman  who  still  loved  much,  but  purely. 
So  the  awakening  demand  of  the  working  people  for 
power,  freedom,  and  well-being  can  be  translated  into 
life  in  terms  either  of  crude  self  -  assertion  or  of  the 

138 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


achievement  of  a  common  good ;  the  proletarian  ex- 
perience of  depletion  and  denial  can  be  turned  into  a 
force  either  for  barren  revolt  or  for  healthful  growth. 
What  must  not  be  done  is  to  seek  to  suppress  these 
rising  passions,  for  the  sacred  hunger  for  life  speaks 
in  them.  Passively  to  ignore  them  and  to  allow  the 
race  to  drift  on  an  unregulated  current  of  impulse  is 
folly;  actively  to  repudiate  them  is  worse  than  folly; 
it  is  the  unpardonable  sin,  —  blasphemy  against  life 
itself. 

"In  the  idealistic  interpretation  of  history,"  —  so 
says  Professor  Commons  again,  discussing  the  career 
of  Horace  Greeley,  — "  there  are  two  kinds  of  idealism, 
a  higher  and  a  lower.  .  .  .  The  higher  idealism  came  to 
Greeley  through  the  transcendentalist  philosophers 
of  his  time.  The  lower  came  from  the  working  classes. 
The  higher  idealism  was  humanitarian,  harmonizing, 
persuasive :  the  lower  was  class-conscious,  aggressive, 
coercive.  The  higher  was  a  plea  for  justice,  the  lower 
was  a  demand  for  rights."  The  antithesis  persists,  and 
if  we  are  wise  we  cannot  afford  to  reject  idealism,  of 
any  type  or  from  any  quarter.  It  is  probable  that  the 
more  democratic  reading  of  history  for  which  we  still 
wait,  and  wait  mostly  in  vain,  will  show  us  that  the 
lower  has  on  the  whole  been  more  operative  than  the 
higher  at  many  unexpected  junctures.  "  The  vitality 
of  tax-supported  schools" — to  borrow  another  illus- 
tration from  Professor  Commons,,  and  from  the  form- 
ative period  of  American  life  —  uwas  derived,  not 
from  the  humanitarian  leaders,  but  from  the  growing 

139 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


class  of  wage -earners."  That  the  advance  in  labor 
legislation  is  due  far  more  to  trade-unions  than  to 
philanthropic  agitation  is  a  contemporary  common- 
place. 

Why  hesitate,  why  shrink,  before  this  rising  power? 
Why  resent  the  summons  to  the  cultured,  the  ease- 
ful, to  follow  the  lead  of  the  poor  ?  This  was  what 
democracy  planned  in  the  beginning,  from  the  time 
when  it  set  forth  on  its  great  unfinished  ad  venture  J 
May  it  not  also  be  exactly  what  Christianity  means, 
when  translated  into  plain  terms  and  given  a  modern 
application?  This  is  hard  to  deny  if  we  agree  that 
Jesus  meant  what  he  said.  He  did  not  bid  his  follow- 
ers to  patronize  the  poor,  nor  to  minister  to  the  poor, 
but  to  identify  themselves  with  the  poor.  Poverty  of 
spirit  was  the  rich  term  that  he  used.  Whether  this 
identification  was  to  be  literal  has  always  been  sub- 
ject of  debate ;  that  it  was  not  to  be  purely  sentimen- 
tal is  less  rarely  asserted  than  it  might  be.  No  one 
who  thinks  can  question  that  it  was  to  be,  in  a  search- 
ing and  revolutionary  sense,  spiritual  and  intellectual. 
Yet  many  are  ready  to  rhapsodize  over  St.  Francis 
embracing  Holy  Poverty  in  the  outward  life,  who 
would  shrink  from  following  the  leaders  of  the  work- 
ing classes  in  the  holy  task  of  social  regeneration. 
We  have  not  yet  begun  to  fathom  the  full  meaning 
of  the  Carpenter  of  Nazareth.  Democracy,  imperfect 
though  it  be,  has  taught  us  a  little.  Possibly  there  is 
even  now  in  the  world  a  power,  natural  heir  of  de- 
mocracy, that  can  teach  us  still  more. 

140 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


We  shall  then  be  more  Christian  as  well  as  more  . 
scientific  if,  instead  of  forming  our  social  program 
out  of  our  own  heads,  or  from  superficial  observation, 
we  study  how  to  direct  aright  the  great  forces  arising 
from  life.  Identification  of  ourselves  with  the  People 
must  be  the  keynote  of  sound  social  advance ;  it  af- 
fords the  only  hope  of  checking  the  habitual  waste  of 
social  effort.  Let  us  hasten  to  say  how  often  the  prin- 
ciple is  accepted  and  practiced,  with  fine  and  fruitful 
results.  But  let  us  also  not  shrink  from  confessing 
how  large  a  proportion  of  philanthropic  and  social 
work,  occasionally  at  least,  violates  it.  Why  not  glance 
at  a  few  practical  examples?  Here  is  the  settlement 
movement,  —  at  its  best  the  highest  expression  of 
social  compunction.  How  often  it  draws  naively  on 
that  very  class-psychology  it  seeks  to  transcend !  What 
is  the  usual  procedure  in  establishing  a  settlement? 
An  uptown  committee ;  funds  raised,  a  plant  prepared, 
by  uptown  money;  a  salaried  staff,  drawn  certainly 
not  from  the  neighborhood  itself,  which  proceeds  with 
devotion  and  energy  to  "  uplift "  that  neighborhood 
by  a  cheerful  application  of  uptown  art,  music,  hy- 
giene, morals,  and  manners.  Often  the  workers  act 
as  if  they  were  dealing  with  an  inert  mass  ;  nor  indeed 
is  it  easy  to  learn  to  work  "with"  instead  of  "for." 
Yet  every  district  pulsates  with  a  life  of  its  own. 
What  failure  to  profit  by  forces  for  good  stronger 
than  we  can  furnish  when  festivities  are  put  on  the 

141 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


date  of  a  mission  at  the  Roman  Catholic  church  round 
the  corner !  What  folly  to  seek  to  please  a  mass  of 
homesick  Italians,  fresh  from  the  land  of  Garibaldi, 
with  an  illustrated  lecture  on  Bunker  Hill !  The  wis- 
est leaders  well  know  that  the  first  aim  should  be  less 
the  initiation  of  accredited  lines  of  social  service  than 
the  close  study  of  forces  already  at  work.  The  apa- 
thetic boy  who,  responds  so  dully  to  the  Club  may  be 
a  political  leader  out  in  the  street.  Too  often  the  real 
life  of  a  neighborhood  is  sealed  from  the  contact  of 
even  the  social  expert,  who  may  live  there  for  years, 
administering  pure  milk  to  the  babies,  and  enticing 
people  to  save  their  pennies  in  the  stamp-bank,  igno- 
rant of  the  somewhat  significant  fact  that  the  same  re- 
gion is  a  hot-bed  of  anarchism  from  which  are  directed 
transactions  that  stir  Europe  to  horror. 

If  social  workers  need  to  identify  themselves  more 
deeply  with  forces  of  popular  birth,  working  people 
should  have  a  share,  through  their  representatives,  in  all 
movements  of  reform  and  relief.  The  movements  of 
real  value  will  usually  be  found  to  be  those  most  read- 
ily indorsed  or  initiated  by  the  workers.  Trades-unions 
have  done  more  to  remove  the  shame  of  child-labor 
than  all  other  agitation  to  that  end  has  yet  to  show.  If 
the  privileged  classes  have  their  consumers'  league,  the 
unions  have  their  label  leagues ;  a  little  deeper  demo- 
cracy, and  the  two  could  be  fused.  Not  till  workingmen 
serve  on  our  organized  charities  and  our  diverse  reform 
associations  more  freely  than  now,  will  these  agencies 
take  their  due  and  right  place  in  social  advance. 

142 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


To  speak  plainly,  is  it  not  over -true  that  the 
first  instinct  among  the  philanthropically  disposed  is 
distrust  of  any  movement  of  truly  popular  origin? 
Three  great  forces  —  not  imposed  from  without,  but 
born  from  within  —  are  to  -  day  affecting  the  in- 
tellectual and  emotional  life  of  the  working  people: 
trades  -  unions,  socialism,  and  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  These  forces  do  not  agree  among  themselves 
any  more  than  the  forces  which  affect  the  upper  classes 
agree ;  but  they  all  operate  with  power,  they  seek  in 
one  sense  no  support  from  without  or  from  above.  In 
all,  there  is  the  note  of  genuine  democracy.  And  to 
all  three  alike  the  attitude  of  the  world  of  privilege 
—  academic,  commercial,  religious  —  is  one  of  distaste 
and  suspicion.  It  is  no  wonder  that  the  socialists 
claim  that  class  -  psychology  dominates  .the  situation, 
for  all  the  stirring  of  our  social  compunction  and  our 
administration  of  Morrison's  Pills.  Our  salvation,  as 
we  have  contended,  is  to  accept  and  utilize  all  move- 
ments of  truly  popular  origin  ;  instead  of  this  we 
habitually  distrust  and  oppose.  We  repudiate  these 
living  powers,  and  our  futility  is  our  punishment. 

A  salient  instance  is  the  reluctant  acceptance  of 
trades-unions.  No  one  can  claim  that  the  unions,  to 
use  their  own  pet  phrase,  do  their  work  in  kid  gloves  ; 
but  they  have  the  immense  advantage  of  being,  not 
an  invention,  but  a  natural  growth,  born  of  sheer 
necessity  from  the  exigencies  of  economic  pressure. 
Twenty-five  years  ago  they  were  fighting  for  recogni- 
tion ;  the  run  of  literature,  and  preaching,  showed 

143 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


clearly  the  general  animus  against  them.  To-day,  they 
are  accepted  by  the  public,  though  still  fought,  as  is 
natural,  by  the  interests  to  which  they  are  opposed. 
One  strong  trade-union,  if  controlled  by  the  better  ele- 
ment, may  be  worth  more  as  a  force  in  moral  education 
in  a  given  city  than  all  the  settlements  and  people's 
institutes  combined.  Tardily,  and  surprised  at  their 
own  temerity,  the  churches  are  recognizing  the  fact 
and  appointing  "  fraternal  delegates."  Had  they  acted 
more  promptly  they,  and  possibly  organized  labor  also, 
would  have  been  saved  from  some  mistakes. 

The  Roman  Church  presents  problems  of  its  own, 
apart  from  the  line  of  our  discussion.  But  what  shall 
we  say  of  this  third  force,  socialism,  —  young  still,  — 
making  its  way  with  difficulty  in  our  country,  on  ac- 
count of  special  conditions,  but  offering  a  wider  solu- 
tion of  our  social  ills  than  can  anywhere  else  be  found  ? 
We  can  of  course  repudiate  it  if  we  like.  Or  we  can 
patronize  it  in  an  expurgated  edition.  Or,  identifying 
ourselves  with  the  passion  and  the  purpose  whence  it 
emerges,  we  may  divest  our  minds  of  prejudice  and 
give  it  in  its  entirety  a  fair,  full  hearing. 

An  increasing  number  of  thinkers  become  warm 
advocates  of  socialism,  yet  eliminate  the  theory  of 
class-consciousness  and  the  class-struggle.  And  in  so 
doing  they  are  well  within  their  rights.  In  a  partially 
democratic  society,  socialism  is  not,  and  cannot  be, 
the  movement  of  one  class  alone.  It  must  make  its 
appeal  broad  enough  to  reach  all  classes.  Yet  if  the 
trend  of  our  thought  be  right,  the  theory  of  the  func- 

144 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


tion  of  the  class-struggle  is  one  which  the  central 
socialist  army  can  never  abandon.  Dangerous  and 
misleading  in  its  cruder  forms,  gravely  disturbing  at 
best,  it  nevertheless  expresses  a  truth  that  our  reluc- 
tance cannot  ignore,  if  the  forces  of  emancipation  must 
be  the  natural  correlative  of  the  economic  phenomena 
of  the  day.  Socialism  is  in  essence  a  working-class 
movement,  and  those  who  adhere  to  it  should  recognize 
that  in  the  designs  of  Providence  the  time  has  come 
for  the  class  that,  though  disinherited,  yet  serves  hu- 
man need  in  most  essential  ways,  to  be  the  leaders 
of  the  whole  race  toward  substantial  freedom. 

VI 

Half  a  century  ago,  cheap  materialistic  talk,  on  the 
part  of  men  who  had  misread  the  popularizers  of 
Darwin,  was  noisily  at  work  confusing  issues,  and  al- 
most smothering  a  rational  synthesis  of  the  old  thought 
with  the  new.  To-day,  the  same  thing  is  going  on  in 
sociology.  But  the  most  positive  scientific  minds  are 
now  reverting  unabashed  to  a  mystical  view  of  the 
universe,  and  we  who  cling  to  our  idealism  may  well 
take  comfort  from  the  analogy.  If  with  Bakunin  we 
recognize  that  "  in  the  social  sphere  the  advance  of 
economic  forces  ...  is  the  determining  base  of  all 
advance,  religious,  philosophic,  political  and  social," 
we  need  in  no  wise  on  account  of  the  concession 
"  repudiate  the  army  of  God." 

On  the  contrary,  a  little  mysticism  blended  with       ' .-/ 
our  economic  determinism  makes  a  very  satisfactory 

145 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


mixture.  WTiy  be  daunted  by  the  fact  that  the  forces 
with  which  we  deal  are  presented  to  us  instead  of  ini- 
tiated by  us  ?  Our  opportunity  is  not  on  this  account 
less,  but  greater  and  more  hopeful. 

Life  would  suddenly  become  very  dull  if  the  ancient 
quarrel  between  materialism  and  idealism  were  settled ; 
nor  can  we  imagine  such  a  consummation,  unless  as 
result  of  some  general  vision  blinding  and  revealing 
as  that  which  greeted  Saul  on  the  road  to  Damascus,  or 
else  of  an  astronomical  cataclysm  that  should  throw  our 
little  star  quite  out  of  the  cosmic  running.  Meantime, 
schools  draw  together.  Where  our  fathers  found  con- 
futation, we  find  reinforcement  to  faith.  The  evolu- 
tionist can  at  his  will  see  in  the  law  that  governs  the 
unfolding  of  the  natural  order  blind  force,  or  the 
speaking  mind  of  God.  The  psychologist  can  either 
reduce  thought  to  nervous  reaction,  or  hail  in  the  very 
physical  basis  of  life  an  elusive  spiritual  phenomenon. 
Is  not  the  same  alternative  open  in  that  economic 
sphere,  last  to  be  studied  by  exact  science  ?  The  eco- 
nomic conditions  that  seemingly  create  our  strongest 
loves  and  aims  are  imperious  and  impassive  as  were 
those  Assyrian  tyrants  whose  insolent  images  confront 
us  from  the  past.  But  what  if  these  great  lords  of 
life  are  themselves  living?  These  "  determined,"  these 
automatic  forces,  which  mechanically  generate  our 
passions  and  powers,  —  may  they  not  themselves  be 
messengers,  fulfilling  a  central  Will?  It  were  imper- 
tinent to  assert  the  contrary.  The  angels  of  the  Apo- 
calypse proclaimed  woes  as  well  as  blessings.  The 

146 


ECONOMIC  DETERMINISM 


class-struggle  which  rises  from  the  insistent  demand 
for  such  general  well-being  as  shall  give  the  soul  its 
room  may  be  the  trumpet-blast  of  an  angel  of  God. 

The  priest  who  condemns,  and  the  revolutionist  who 
exalts,  socialism  because  it  is  materialistic  are  equally 
wrong ;  Bakunin  and  Mazzini  needed  each  the  other. 
For  the  great  economic  order,  with  its  steady  trend 
toward  a  goal  that  we  perhaps  begin  to  discern,  is  no 
dead  thing  because  its  movements  are  not  in  our  keep- 
ing. The  material  universe,  forever  evolving  into  new 
likeness  through  forces  in  which  our  conscious  efforts , 
have  so  limited  a  share,  is  neither  an  evil  to  fight  or 
ignore,  nor  an  ultimate  end  to  rest  in.  It  is  a  sacra- 
ment ordained  to  convey  spiritual  life  to  us.  This  is 
what  neither  mystic  nor  revolutionary  has  learned. 

But  those  reformers,  those  idealists,  who  often,  at 
the  cost  of  needless  waste,  dedicate  themselves  in  ever- 
increasing  numbers  to  the  healing  of  social  disorders, 
must  learn  it.  We  would-be  re-creators  of  the  earth 
must  follow,  for  we  cannot  lead.  This  earth  is  indeed 
ours  to  shape  ;  but  only  when  we  have  understood  that 
meekness  alone  inherits  it.  So  long  as  we  seek  to  force 
on  it  separatist  and  fantastic  ideas  of  our  own  inven- 
tion, however  lofty  and  plausible,  we  shall  stumble  and 
fail.  H-We  must  gain  our  clue  from  close  study  of  the 
unfolding  purpose  in  the  economic  order.  To  dream  .of 
altering  or  interrupting  this  order  is  the  folly  in  which 
anarchist  and  philanthropist  unite.  In  natural  science, 
and  in  psychology,  men  are  now  wisely  evading  in- 
quiry into  the  ever-vicious  circle  of  precedence  and 

117 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


origin,  and  turning  to  the  more  fruitful  study  of  rela- 
tions. Only  in  sociology,  the  new  quest  is  hardly  begun. 
Economic  determinism  and  social  idealism  continue  to 
give  each  other  the  lie  over  contemptuous  shoulders. 
The  need  of  the  hour  is  to  make  them  turn  around, 
join  hands,  and  together  face  the  future. 


CHAPTER  II 

CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


WE  have  already  touched  on  the  burning  question 
of  class-consciousness  and  the  class-struggle,  but  we 
are  not  yet  ready  to  dismiss  it.  For  the  stubborn 
moral  sense  still  recoils  from  many  implications  of 
the  doctrine,  saying  that  the  cooperation  with  demo- 
cratic forces  for  which  we  have  pleaded  may  be  all 
very  well  while  these  forces  are  innocent  and  pacific, 
but  that  class-consciousness,  in  many  cases,  is  neither. 
On  the  contrary,  the  class-struggle  spells  obstinate 
hate.  The  avowed  desire  of  the  central  socialist  army 
is  to  fan  antagonistic  impulses  toward  separateness, 
now  smouldering  among  the  unprivileged,  to  a  con- 
suming blaze.  To  encourage  the  class-struggle  is  to 
foment  revolt,  to  glorify  self-interest,  and  to  applaud 
all  the  instincts  which  a  nobler  ethic  seeks  to  discredit. 

The  actual  industrial  spectacle  intensifies  the  hor- 
ror which  the  doctrine  inspires.  For  the  class-war  is 
a  fact,  and  a  stern  one.  It  lurks  in  every  factory,  it 
flares  out  in  every  instance  of  extortion  and  oppres- 
sion. We  perceive  it  in  the  cruel  and  vile  instinct  to 
distrust  the  poor,  still  common  among  the  privileged, 
even  in  their  philanthropic  moments.  It  is  to  be 
seen  no  less  in  the  rising  indignation  and  unrest  of 

149 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


the  awakened  workers.  Strikes,  lock-outs,  boycotts, 
are  its  ominous  weapons.  In  skirmishes  now  and 
again  red  blood  has  been  shed.  True,  it  is  more  and 
more  likely  that  the  socialist  weapon  of  the  future 
will  be  ballot  rather  than  bomb ;  none  the  less,  even 
in  Anglo-Saxon  countries,  we  may  possibly  find  that 
Kropotkin's  searching  reminder  that  revolutionary 
crises  are  a  normal  part  of  evolutionary  advance  is  to 
find  illustration  once  more.  For  class  is  more  and  more 
consciously  pitted  against  class,  and  the  closely  organ- 
ized ranks  are  closing  fast. 

Under  these  circumstances  it  certainly  takes  cour- 
age of  no  simple  type  to  indorse  the  doctrine  of  the 
class-struggle.  To  do  so  means  that  at  lowest  we  wel- 
come discontent ;  it  may  mean  that  we  are  called  to 
rejoice  in  revolt.  It  demands  that  we  hail  with  sat- 
isfaction, instead  of  dismay,  the  steady  dogged  rise 
of  proletariat  claims  to  higher  wages,  shorter  hours, 
larger  compensations  in  injury.  It  means  that  while 
we  may  be  mildly  pleased  with  the  announcement  of 
a  new  profit-sharing  scheme  on  the  part  of  employers, 
our  hearts  leap  with  more  confident  gladness  when  an 
increase  of  wages  has  been  won  by  a  group  of  em- 
ployees. We  shall  approve  of  any  shrinking  in  the 
ranks  of  free  labor,  any  accession  to  the  ranks  of  the 
organized ;  shall  encourage  the  spread  of  radical  and 
subversive  teaching  among  the  working  people,  make 
an  act  of  thanks  for  Milwaukee,  note  with  joy  the 
socialist  propaganda  in  New  York,  and  desire  by  all 
rightful  means  to  persuade  the  helpless  unthinking 

150 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


mass  of  the  workers  that  power  and  responsibility  are 
in  their  hands. 

The  majority  of  educated  men  are  obviously  not 
yet  at  this  point.  What  we  find  to-day,  on  the  part  of 
most  honest  people,  is  a  general  claim  to  non-partisan- 
ship in  case  of  industrial  disturbance :  a  virtuous  if 
platitudinous  plea  that  the  public  stand  off  while  the 
matter  is  decided  on  its  merits.  And  of  course  in  a 
sense  this  is  quite  the  right  attitude.  Only  it  is  not 
the  whole  story.  It  never  was,  it  never  will  be ;  the 
convictions  that  control  and  create  life  are  not  gener- 
ated in  this  way.  Pure  disinterestedness  never  occurs. 
It  belongs  to  equations,  not  to  men  ;  at  best  it  is  aca- 
demic, not  human.  In  a  given  crisis,  the  undertow  of 
sympathy,  not  the  estimate  of  right  in  detail,  is  the  big 
thing,  the  thing  worth  noting.  Nor  is  this  any  more 
lamentable  than  the  fact  that  a  special  episode  in  a 
drama  must  be  justly  judged,  not  on  its  own  merits, 
but  in  its  relation  to  the  whole  drift  of  the  play. 

The  undertow  is  changing,  the  tide  is  at  the  turn. 
It  is  disquieting  or  inspiriting,  according  to  one's 
prejudices,  to  observe  the  extraordinarily  slow  shift- 
ing of  sympathy  in  matters  industrial,  during  the  past 
twenty  -  five  years,  toward  the  side  of  the  workers. 
True,  men  still  like  to  demand  a  clear  case,  a  miracle 
that  has  perhaps  never  yet  been  seen.  But  here  is  the 
change :  of  old,  when  the  workers  were  proved  in  the 
wrong,  the  public  exulted ;  to-day,  it  is  disappointed. 
The  change  is  amazing,  but  it  is  still  wavering ;  nor 
do  men  yet  recognize  the  underdrift  of  sympathy  in 

151 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


which  they  are  caught.  This  drift  is  the  recognition 
that  the  working  classes  must  achieve  their  own  sal- 
vation, and  that  such  salvation  demands  not  only  frag- 
ments of  improvement  grudgingly  bestowed,  but  a 
general  pressure,  if  not  toward  social  equality,  then 
at  least  to  the  point  where  a  "  living  wage  "  shall 
secure  the  chance  for  all  manhood  to  rise  to  its  highest 
level. 

As  the  drift  slowly  becomes  conscious,  people  grow 
troubled.  For  they  see  that  it  involves  two  things :  — 

First,  the  sharp  belief  that  privilege  must  be  cut 
down  before  our  general  life  can  flourish.  Now,  the 
finer  idealism  does  not  shrink  from  this  idea  in  itself. 
Disinterested  men,  including  some  who  have  a  stake 
in  the  game,  are  coming  to  admit  it ;  many  are  even 
inclined  to  accept  the  central  socialist  tenet,  that  no 
effective  cure  for  our  social  evils  will  be  found  until  a 
large  proportion  at  least  of  wealth-producing  wealth 
be  socially  owned.  Most  people  disagree  with  this  pro- 
position, but  it  no  longer  shocks  the  common  mind. 

But  there  is  that  other  implication  from  which  the 
moral  sense  recoils :  the  encouragement  of  class-con- 
sciousness as  a  militant  weapon.  For  are  we  not  com- 
ing to  object  to  any  weapons  at  all  ?  Just  when  the 
old  political  militarism  is  coming  to  be  at  a  discount 
in  the  idealist  ranks,  this  new  form  of  war  —  conflict 
in  industrial  relations  —  makes  its  appearance  among 
pitiable  mortals  ;  and  our  enthusiasm  is  enlisted  to 
foster  in  the  working  people  the  very  traits  which 
civilization  is  struggling  to  leave  behind !  True,  phy- 

152 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


sical  violence  is  honestly  deplored  by  both  sides,  and 
even  extremists  ardently  hope  that  we  may  spell  our 
Revolution  without  the  R.  None  the  less  are  the  pas- 
sions educed  by  the  whole  situation  essentially  those 
of  the  battlefield ;  men  exult  in  wresting  advantages 
from  their  antagonists,  they  are  trained  to  regard  one 
another  as  adversaries,  not  brothers.  And  this  in  the 
very  age  theoretically  agog  for  peace  !  The  good  peo- 
ple who  would  fain  see  all  social  progress  proceed 
from  the  growing  generosities  of  realized  brother- 
hood, find  a  mere  travesty  of  their  desires  in  gains  won 
through  self-assertion.  Shall  the  lovers  of  peace  sym- 
pathize with  a  movement  for  quickening  discontent  and 
making  hatred  effective  ?  Shall  we  lend  our  approval 
to  destroying  whatever  meekness  the  poor  may  have, 
and  summon  them  to  curse  that  poverty  which  a  cer- 
tain word  calls  blessed?  It  is  time  to  call  a  halt! 

There  is  doubtless  some  unconscious  prejudice  on 
the  side  of  privilege  in  all  this.  But  there  is  some- 
thing better  too,  and  every  honest  socialist  knows  it. 
The  theory  of  class-consciousness  does  offend  the  con- 
science of  the  moralist  as  often  as  the  sister  doctrine  of 
economic  determinism  offends  the  intellect  of  the  phi- 
losopher. 

II 

Frank  confession  behooves  us  at  the  outset.  Class- 
consciousness  is  a  weapon,  and  to  applaud  it  does 
involve  a  militant  attitude.  If  people  say  that  it  is 
ip so  facto  discredited  thereby,  we  can  only  enter 

153 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


a  plea  for  consistency.  Virtuous  disapproval  of  the 
working-class  struggle  sits  ill  on  the  lips  of  those  who 
point  out  with  zest  the  stimulating  qualities  of  the 
competitive  system  and  vote  enthusiastically  for  the 
increase  of  armaments.  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the 
man  who  talks  Jingo  politics  most  loudly,  and  defends 
with  most  vigor  the  admirable  necessity  to  commerce 
of  the  triumph  of  the  strong,  is  habitually  the  very 
person  most  outraged  at  the  pressure  of  a  united  pro- 
letariat group  toward  freedom.  Yet  he  may  be  hard 
put  to  it  to  persuade  the  man  from  Mars  that  to  fight 
for  one's  country  is  glorious  while  to  fight  for  one's 
class  is  an  inspiration  of  the  devil.  Good  Paterfamilias, 
sweating  to  discomfit  your  competitors  for  the  sake  of 
your  darlings  at  home,  how  convince  our  visitor  that  in 
defending  the  interests  of  your  family  you  fulfill  a 
sacred  duty,  while  your  employee,  fighting  for  the  in- 
terests of  his  industrial  group,  flings  a  menace  at  so- 
ciety ?  There  is  only  one  ground  on  which  the  distinc- 
tion can  be  maintained:  the  assumption  that  family 
and  nation  are  holy  things  to  be  protected  at  any  cost, 
while  class  is  an  unholy  thing  which  deserves  no  pro- 
tection. The  position  has  force ;  but,  curiously  enough, 
those  ready  to  agree  to  it  are  the  stubbornly  "  class- 
conscious." 

However,  the  matter  is  too  serious  to  be  met  by 
an  oblique  argument.  The  instinct  which  considers 
class-feeling  to  be  inferior  to  family  feeling  or  pa- 
triotism probably  rests  on  the  opinion  that  the  forces 
which  create  class  are  not  only  divisive,  but  selfish 

154 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


and  material.  Mazzini  proffered  an  interesting  plea  for 
the  superiority  of  political  over  social  passion  on  the 
ground  that  the  first  alone  was  idealist  and  disinter- 
ested. Although  threatened,  belief  that  the  family  is 
a  spiritual  and  sacramental  unit  is  deeply  ingrain. 
And  yet  must  we  not  recognize  the  same  foundation  in 
all  three  cases?  Patriotism  rests  upon  reliance  on  the 
protection  afforded  by  the  State ;  the  family  is  created 
by  the  craving  for  self -perpetuation.  Class-feeling,  too, 
has  its  sacramental  sweetness.  Of  the  strands  from 
which  it  is  woven  many  derive  no  color  from  personal 
advantage. 

As  for  warfare,  we  all  agree  that  its  moral  values 
are  provisional,  and  look  eagerly  to  that  promised 
time  "  when  war  shall  be  no  more."  But  while  the 
vision  tarries,  no  one  who  accepts  that  provisional 
value  in  one  field  should  disallow  it  in  another.  Most 
of  us  moreover  hold  it  to  be  a  real  value,  and  still 
thrill  unabashed  to  martial  strains.  Why  did  Thack- 
eray present  soldiers  as  the  only  men  among  the  weak 
egotists  of  Vanity  Fair  to  preserve  a  standard  of  self- 
less honor  ?  Why  did  Tennyson  hail  the  clash  of  arms 
as  the  only  means  of  transforming  the  smug  clerks  of 
England  into  her  patriots  ?  Not  because  these  authors 
approved  a  militant  ideal,  but  because  they  knew  such 
an  ideal  to  be  nobler  than  prosperous  sloth  and  self- 
absorption.  Battle  is  deep  embedded  in  our  finiteness. 
As  Helen  Gray  Cone  nobly  puts  it,  — 

In  this  rubric,  lo  !  the  past  is  lettered  : 
Strike  the  red  words  out,  we  strike  the  glory  : 

155 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


Leave  the  sacred  color  on  the  pages, 
Pages  of  the  Past  that  teach  the  Future. 

Ou  that  scripture 
Yet  shall  young  souls  take  the  oath  of  service. 

God  end  war  !  But  when  brute  war  is  ended, 
Yet  shall  there  be  many  a  noble  soldier, 
Many  a  noble  battle  worth  the  winning, 
Many  a  hopeless  battle  worth  the  losing. 

Life  is  battle : 
Life  is  battle,  even  to  the  sunset. 

The  Apocalypse  which  ends  with  Jerusalem,  Vision 
of  Peace,  is  chiefly  occupied  with  chronicling  in  suc- 
cession of  awesome  symbols  the  eternal  Wars  of  the 
Lord.  In  the  teachings  of  Christ  there  are  three  bitter 
sayings  against  smooth  conventionality  for  one  against 
violence,  since  the  context  shows  that  the  saying  about 
non-resistance  is  personal,  not  social,  in  application. 
We  may  not  dismiss  class-consciousness  as  evil  on  the 
mere  score  that  it  arouses  the  passions  of  war.  To 
determine  its  value,  its  end  must  be  questioned,  and 
the  qualities  evoked  by  the  conflict  must  be  scanned. 

Ill 

Let  us  take  the  last  task  first,  for  in  fulfilling  it 
we  may  almost  hope  to  reassure  those  gentle  folk,  — 
notably  on  the  increase  even  while  nominal  Quakerism 
declines,  —  the  lovers  of  peace  at  any  price.  We  may 
not  approve  war  for  the  sake  of  its  by-products  alone, 
but  when  these  are  valuable  we  may  find  in  them  some 
consolation  for  such  war  as  is  bound  to  exist.  The 

156 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


class-conscious  movement  has  two  precious  results :  its 
inner  disciplines,  and  its  power  to  widen  sympathies. 

Even  the  most  recalcitrant  grant  the  value  of  an 
army  from  the  first  point  of  view.  Military  life  affords 
a  unique  training  in  the  very  virtues  most  needed 
by  a  democratic  state :  humility  and  self-effacement ; 
courage,  and  swift  power  of  decision,  —  the  qualities 
of  subordination  and  of  leadership.  We  all  hope  to 
foster  these  qualities  through  the  opportunities  of 
peace,  but  so  far  our  success  is  so  imperfect  that  we 
can  hardly  disregard  the  help  presented  by  the  crises 
of  war.  Nowhere  is  this  help  more  striking  than  in 
the  class-conscious  movement.  Consider  those  class- 
conscious  groups  called  trade-unions.  Seen  from  with- 
out, especially  in  time  of  stress,  a  union  may  appear 
actuated  by  the  worst  impulses :  ruthless  in  pressing 
unreasonable  demands,  callously  indifferent  to  incon- 
veniencing the  public,  stubbornly  self-seeking.  Seen 
from  within,  the  aspect  alters.  Here  is  no  longer  a 
compact  unit  fighting  for  selfish  ends,  but  a  throng  of 
individuals,  each  struggling  no  more  for  himself  than 
for  his  neighbor.  In  such  an  organic  group — com- 
posed, be  it  remembered,  of  very  simple  and  ignorant 
people  —  you  shall  see  each  member  submitted  to 
severe  discipline  in  the  most  valuable  and  difficult 
thing  in  the  world,  —  team-work. 

Wordsworth  found  in  Nature  the  over-ruling  power 
"to  kindle  and  restrain,"  and  it  is  not  far-fetched  to 
say  that  this  same  double  function,  so  essential  to  the 
shaping  of  character,  is  performed  for  working  people 

157 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


by  the  trade -union.  It  kindles  sacrifice,  endurance, 
and  vision ;  it  restrains  violent  and  individualistic  im- 
pulse, and  fits  the  man  or  woman  to  play  due  part  in 
corporate  and  guided  action.  Those  who  have  stood 
shoulder  to  shoulder  with  the  women  during  one  of 
the  garment  -  workers'  strikes  that  have  marked  the 
last  few  years,  have  watched  with  reverence  the  moral 
awakening  among  the  girls,  born  of  loyalty  to  a  collect- 
ive cause.  It  was  the  typical  employer,  defending  the 
American  fetish  of  the  Open  Shop,  who  remarked,  — 
when  his  clever  Italian  forewoman  asked  him,  "  Ain't 
you  sorry  to  make  those  people  work  an  hour  and  a 
half  for  twelve  cents  ?  "  —  "  Don't  you  care.  You 
don't  understand  America.  Why  do  you  worry  about 
those  peoples  ?  Here  the  foolish  people  pay  the  smart." 
And  it  was  the  spirited  girl  who  replied  to  him, "  Well, 
now  the  smart  people  will  teach  the  foolish,"  —  and 
led  her  shop  out  on  strike.  Which  better  understood 
America  and  its  needs  ?  There  is  no  question  which 
had  learned  the  truth  that  freedom  consists,  not  in  sep- 
arateness  but  in  fellowship,  not  in  self-assertion  but  in 
self-effacement.  The  employer  of  so-called  "  free  labor  " 
denies  this  sacred  truth  ;  for  the  liberty  he  defends  is 
that  of  the  disintegrating  dust,  not  that  of  the  corpuscle 
of  living  blood.  By  his  vicious  doctrine,  "  each  man  is 
free  to  make  his  own  bargain,"  he  is  doing  his  best  to 
retard  the  evolution  of  the  workers  toward  the  citizen- 
ship of  the  future. 

To  note  the  services  of  the  unions  in  the  quickening 
of  international  sympathy,  we  need  only  point  to  the 

158 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


situation  in  one  of  our  mining  communities.  For  in 
the  union  is  the  only  power  competent  to  fuse  the  be- 
wildered immigrant  masses  into  some  unity  of  aim. 
Where  else  may  we  look  for  a  fire  to  dissipate  selfish- 
ness, misunderstanding,  and  distrust  in  our]  melting- 
pot,  in  the  heat  of  common  aspiration  ?  Trades-unions 
are  no  homes  of  sentiment.  Yet  beneath  their  frequent 
corruptions  and  tyrannies  is  an  extraordinary  under- 
tow of  just  such  idealism  as  the  United  States  most 
needs.  Struggling  for  harmony  within,  pitted  against 
the  capitalist  class  without,  the  union  finds  its  gallant 
work  full  of  dramatic  terror  and  promise.  Again  and 
again  the  strain  is  over-great.  Like  all  other  group- 
passions,  class-feeling  tends  easily  to  the  bitterness  of 
clique  or  the  tyrannies  of  oligarchy.  The  scab  is  un- 
able to  rise  above  the  idea  of  self -protection.  Irishman 
will  not  work  with  Italian,  nor  Gentile  with  Jew.  The 
union,  finding  a  feeble  response  to  disinterested  mo- 
tives, resorts  to  intimidation  to  build  and  hold  its 
membership.  Corruption,  fierce  enough  to  incline  one 
toward  an  anarchistic  return  to  nature,  is  as  much  in 
evidence  as  in  politics.  Violence  and  crime  may  be  com- 
mitted in  the  union's  name.  None  the  less,  with  slow 
serious  searching,  the  process  goes  on  by  which  a  ship  or 
a  state  finds  itself,  as  each  atom  becomes  dimly  infused 
with  the  holy  sense  of  its  relation  to  the  Whole. 

Socialism,  the  other  great  class-conscious  force,  is 
as  yet  little  found  among  us  except  when  imported. 
Menacing  enough,  the  anarchical  type  that  drifts  to 
us  from  southern  Europe ;  as  ignorant  as  indifferent 

159 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


concerning  American  conditions ;  expecting,  like  many 
another  creed,  to  save  the  world  outright  by  the  ap- 
plication of  a  formula.  Yet,  here  too,  we  may  already 
discern  assets  to  be  cherished.  Memory  rises  of  illu- 
mined eyes  belonging  to  a  young  Italian.  Brought  up, 
or  rather  kicked  up,  in  a  stable  at  Naples,  a  young 
animal  when  twenty,  unable  to  read,  careless  of  all  ex- 
cept the  gratification  of  desire,  he  found  himself  errand- 
boy  in  a  restaurant  frequented  by  a  small  socialist 
group.  Then  came  the  awakening :  "  How  behave 
longer  like  a  beast,  signora  ?  I  could  not  disgrace  the 
comrades !  How  should  Luigi  get  drunk  ?  There  was 
the  Cause  to  serve.  I  served  it  there,  I  serve  it  here. 
I  now  live  clean.  Life  is  holy. "  Luigi  had  experienced 
that  purifying,  that  rare,  that  liberating  good,  alle- 
giance to  an  idea !  Thinking  goes  on  in  all  class-con- 
scious groups  :  and  while  we  feebly  try  to  moralize  and 
educate  the  poor,  forces  are  rising  from  their  very 
heart,  generated  by  the  grim  realities  of  the  industrial 
situation,  competent  to  check  self -absorption  and  widen 
horizons. 

Nor  in  our  straits  can  we  afford  to  despise  the 
international  passion  of  socialism,  for  it  is  a  strong 
force  at  work  among  the  people,  capable  of  kindling  in 
them  the  sense,  so  needed  here,  of  universal  brother- 
hood. Adjustment  of  loyalties  between  old  countries 
and  new  is  a  delicate  problem  sure  to  be  increasingly 
pressing  among  us.  No  good  American  wants  the  old 
forgotten;  no  right-thinking  immigrant  should  wish 
the  new  ignored. 

160 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


True  love  in  this  differs  from  gold  and  clay, 
That  to  divide  is  not  to  take  away. 

He  who  loves  two  countries  is  richer  than  he  who 
loves  one  only ;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  our  newcomers 
usually  end  in  loving  none.  These  spiritual  exiles  pre- 
sent the  pathetic  spectacle,  not  of  one  man  without  a 
country,  but  of  great  throngs. 

At  the  North  End  in  Boston,  Denison  House  con- 
ducts a  Sunday  lecture  course  for  Italians.  The  con- 
trol disclaims  responsibility  for  opinions  presented  on 
this  practically  free  forum ;  yet  American  members 
consented  with  some  reluctance  to  invite  a  speaker 
representing  a  society  organized  to  strengthen  the 
bond  to  Italy,  and  suspected  of  discouraging  natural- 
ization. With  anxiety  of  another  type,  it  asked  a 
socialist  club  to  send  the  orator  for  our  next  meet- 
ing. But  what  the  speaker  did  was  to  talk  with  fire 
and  eloquence,  grateful  to  his  grave  Latin  audience, 
on  the  theme  of  the  necessity  to  the  Italian  in  the 
United  States  of  a  new  patriotism  broad  enough  to 
disregard  old  lines,  and  to  express  itself  in  loyal 
American  citizenship,  and  in  cooperation  with  all 
that  was  progressive  in  the  life  of  the  United  States. 
The  inspiration  of  class-conscious  internationalism  was 
plain  in  the  speech,  and  it  did  more  to  quicken  a 
civic  conscience  than  any  words  of  ours  could  have 
achieved. 

But  why  stress,  perhaps  selfishly,  the  peculiar  gift 
of  such  faith  in  one  special  national  situation  ?  The 
gain  is  broader,  deeper !  Class  feeling  quickens  that 

161 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


imaginative  power  which  democracy  most  needs.  The 
tired  workman,  absorbed  in  his  machine,  suddenly 
finds  far  horizons  open  to  his  spirit.  He  hears  the 
heart-beats  of  his  brothers  in  Italy,  in  Russia,  in  Bo- 
hemia, in  Denmark;  and  behold!  a  new  means  for 
accomplishing  the  central  work  of  the  ages,  for  releas- 
ing him  from  that  self-centred  egotism  which  is  at  once 
the  condition  of  his  finite  existence  and  the  barrier 
that  he  must  transcend  if  he  is  to  know  himself  a 
partaker  of  the  infinite. 

What  must,  in  conclusion  and  summary,  be  broadly 
asserted  against  clap-trap,  whether  that  clap-trap  be 
talked  in  the  name  of  Marx  or  of  his  opponents,  is 
that  the  socialist  movement  alike  in  Europe  and 
America,  taken  in  the  large,  fosters  disinterestedness 
in  its  adherents  to  a  degree  realized  by  no  other  mod- 
ern force.  No  sensible  socialist  expects  a  personal  gain 
from  his  creed,  since  he  cannot  look  for  a  triumph 
of  his  cause  during  his  own  lifetime,  complete  enough 
to  affect  his  private  destiny.  What  he  is  consciously 
fighting  for  is  the  welfare  of  men  unborn.  As  for  the 
leaders  of  the  movement,  they  are  neither  demagogues 
nor  anarchists.  With  a  few  exceptions,  they  are  men 
so  able  that  if  they  chose  to  leave  the  proletarian  ranks, 
they  could  easily  mount  to  success  on  accredited 
lines.  If,  as  in  the  cases  of  Millerand  and  Briand,  so- 
cialism rightly  or  wrongly  suspects  them  of  a  personal 
ambition,  it  promptly  discredits  them.  If  one  contrasts 
the  grave  emotions  that  inspire  alike  the  leaders  and 
the  rank  and  file  with  the  dreary  barrenness  of  psychi- 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


cal  life  and  the  welter  of  individualistic  preoccupations 
that  obtains  among  the  unorganized  and  unaroused 
working  masses,  one  thrills  to  the  sense  of  something 
high  and  noble,  and  can  hardly  fall  short  of  hailing 
in  the  class-struggle  whether  it  express  itself  through 
trades-unionism  or  socialism  one  of  those  inspiriting 
forces  that  are  the  glory  of  history.  Abraham  Lincoln 
had  probably  never  heard  the  famous  phrase  of  Marx, 
but  he  had  his  own  version  of  it :  "  The  strongest  bond 
of  human  sympathy  outside  the  family,"  said  he, 
"  should  be  one  uniting  all  working  people  of  all  na- 
tions and  tongues  and  kindreds."  On  what  grounds 
rests  this  surprising  and  deliberate  statement  of  our 
greatest  American  ?  On  his  intuition  of  the  sanctity 
of  labor,  and  probably  also  on  his  perception  of  a 
vast  liberating  power  in  this  feeling  for  class.- 

IV 

From  tribal  days,  group-consciousness  has  always 
involved  a  defiant  attitude  toward  those  outside  the 
group,  yet  it  has  always  been  one  of  the  chief  forms  of 
moral  education.  The  larger  the  group  toward  which 
loyalty  is  evoked,  the  greater  the  emancipation  from 
pettiness ;  and  if  class-consciousness  is  the  most  im- 
pressive form  of  group-consciousness  up  to  date,  it  is 
because  the  working  people  include  a  majority  of  the 
human  race. 

Until  economic  development  had  reached  its  present 
point,  class-consciousness  could  not  have  risen  to  the 
status  of  a  world-power.  Those  whom  it  affects  are  the 

163 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


masses,  voiceless  through  the  long  historic  story :  with- 
out coherence,  other  than  that  of  trampled  dust ;  with- 
out common  aim,  other  than  such  as  animates  a  herd  of 
terror-driven  cattle.  Only  occasionally,  under  stress 
of  some  sharp  immediate  oppression,  has  a  brief  sense 
of  fellowship  sprung  into  transient  flame,  soon  sinking 
into  ashes.  To-day  that  healthful  fire  is  creeping  stead- 
ily and  stealthily  on,  spreading  from  land  to  land, 
from  speech  to  speech.  We  shall  do  well  to  welcome 
it,  for  what  it  will  burn  is  dross,  not  gold. 

Yet  the  very  newness  of  the  force  shocks  and  terri- 
fies. Race  and  nation  have  long  broken  humanity  into 
groups  on  perpendicular  lines.  Class  introduces  a 
broad  horizontal  division.  The  mighty  emotions  it 
generates  move  laterally,  so  to  speak,  interpenetrating 
the  other  groups.  They  may  be  competent  to  overcome 
in  large  degree,  as  we  have  claimed,  the  deep-seated 
antagonisms  —  racial,  political,  religious  —  that  sepa- 
rate men  and  hinder  brotherhood.  But  is  not  a  grave 
danger  involved  in  this  very  power?  These  older 
loyalties  were  subject  to  abuse,  but  after  all  they  were 
in  their  essence  sacred.  Should  we  welcome  loyalty  to 
class  if  it  threatens  them  ?  Will  not  this  loyalty  dull 
the  allegiance  men  rightly  and  jealously  cherish,  to 
family,  to  nation,  and  to  Church  ? 

This  is  no  invented  fear.  It  is  quick,  operative, 
and  in  certain  measure  justified.  The  conflict  of  loyal- 
ties is  the  persistent  tragedy  of  civilization.  Look  at 
the  ages  of  feudalism.  The  threefold  passions  that 
inspired  and  sustained  chivalry  at  its  height  were 

164 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


loyalty  to  the  Over-Lord,  to  the  Lady,  and  to  God, 
How  brilliantly  do  all  three  shine  in  that  mirror  of 
the  chivalric  ideal,  Malory's  "  Morte  Etarthur  "  !  The 
splendor  of  unflinching  fidelity  to  King  Arthur  illum- 
inates the  figure  of  Gawain  until  his  death.  High 
service  of  Iseult  nerves  the  arm  of  Tristram. ?v"  O'er 
moor  and  fen,  o'er  crag  and  torrent,"  Galahad  fol- 
lows the  receding,  alluring  vision  of  the  Holy  Grail. 
But  where  do  we  find  the  three  united  and  at  peace  ? 
Tristram  betrays  Mark  his  king.  Gawain,  the  light  o' 
love,  is  equally  heedless  of  religion.  Galahad,  the  as- 
cetic, is  allowed  no  earthly  lady,  and  his  obedience  to 
the  heavenly  vision  is  occasion  for  the  disruption  of  the 
earthly  realm.  In  one  heart  only  do  the  three  loyalties 
meet,  —  and  it  is  the  heart  of  Lancelot,  where  they 
fight  as  fierce  contending  flames.  Spiritual  passion 
conquers  in  the  end,  but  only  when  the  other  two  are 
routed,  when  Arthur  lies  in  helpless  trance  in  Avalon, 
and  Guinevere  is  clothed  with  the  religious  habit.  Sin 
and  remorse  have  been  the  portion  of  the  protagonist 
whose  soul  has  been  the  battlefield.  Here  is  the  sym- 
bol of  the  hurtling  strife,  never  settled,  never  ceasing, 
which  occupied  those  Middle  Ages  that  aimed  and 
aimed  in  vain  at  a  harmonious  synthesis  of  political 
passion,  religious  devotion,  and  earthly  love. 

Not  only  in  the  Middle  Ages  have  those  loyalties 
best  accredited  by  time  been  hard  to  reconcile,  even 
among  themselves.  Contemporary  France  and  Italy 
may  witness  to  the  distress  entailed  by  the  immemo- 
rial clash  between  religion  and  the  State.  How  can  we 

165 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


welcome  a  new  appeal,  which  runs  counter  to  all  the 
others?  Does  not  the  class-loyalty  to  which  socialism 
summons  an  already  distracted  race  complicate  the 
situation  past  endurance  ? 

Socialists  themselves  well  illustrate  the  danger. 
The  inimical  attitude  toward  family  ties,  marked 
enough  among  some  socialist  groups,  springs  indeed 
from  other  sources  and  is  not  relevant  here  to  consider. 
But  as  to  religion,  it  is  true  enough  that  socialism  is 
replacing  everything  else  for  many  of  its  adherents 
and  filling  the  only  need  they  experience  for  faith  and 
an  ideal.  "  The  one,  the  only  religion  of  the  future, 
—  socialism,"  —  writes  an  enthusiastic  comrade  in  a 
socialist  daily  that  falls  at  this  moment  under  the 
hand.  We  may  in  fairness  as  we  have  already  done 
ascribe  this  situation  to  temporary  causes.  But  we 
have  still  to  reckon  with  the  indifference  of  the  move- 
ment to  patriotism,  an  indifference  which  rose  to 
antagonism  in  early  socialist  history.  Marx  in  the 
"  Manifesto  "  said  that  the  working  people  have  no 
fatherland.  Bakunin  could  write :  "  From  the  point 
of  view  of  humanity  and  justice,  patriotism  is  an  evil 
thing,  for  it  is  the  direct  negation  of  the  equality  and 
solidarity  of  mankind.  The  social  question  can  be  sat- 
isfactorily solved  only  by  the  abolition  of  frontiers." 
In  view  of  the  large  degree  to  which  similar  talk  may 
still  be  heard,  we  can  hardly  wonder  if  so  searching  a 
thinker  as  Mr.  Herbert  Croly,  not  to  speak  of  many 
others,  should  find  the  chief  threat  of  socialism  to 
consist  in  its  menace  to  the  national  principle.  Strong 

166 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


language,  like  that  quoted  above,  however,  marked 
the  infancy  of  the  movement  and  is  increasingly  dis- 
carded. Patriotism  has  deep  roots,  and  socialists  are 
men.  The  issue  has  been  hotly  discussed  in  those  so- 
cialist conventions  where  a  rare  and  refreshing  interest 
in  great  intellectual  issues  obtains.  And  "the  view 
is  gaining  ground  among  socialists,"  says  Sombart, 
44  that  all  civilization  has  its  roots  in  nationality,  and 
that  civilization  can  reach  its  highest  development 
only  on  the  basis  of  nationality.1'  It  is  this  growing 
conviction  which  makes  the  socialists  sympathetic 
champions  of  oppressed  peoples  like  the  Poles  and 
Armenians.  44  The  socialist  purpose,"  says  a  promin- 
ent leader,  4t  is  to  give  to  the  proletariat  an  opportun- 
ity of  sharing  in  the  national  life  at  its  best.  Socialism 
and  the  national  idea  are  thus  not  opposed :  they 
supplement  each  other.  Nationality  in  its  present  form 
is  a  precious  possession." 

It  is  comfortable  to  know  that  such  utterances  are 
increasing.  So  far  as  the  practical  situation  goes, 
there  are  no  better  Americans  than  trade-union  men, 
and  the  possible  service  in  the  next  act  of  our  national 
drama  of  the  very  internationalist  feeling  of  social- 
ism has  been  already  signaled.  Meanwhile,  we  cannot 
wonder  if  the  movement,  entranced  with  its  new  vision 
of  a  universal  brotherhood  of  workers,  has  for  the 
time  disparaged  other  ties.  That  is  human  nature. 
On  account  of  the  narrowness  of  our  capacities,  loyal- 
ties, as  we  have  seen,  conflict,  and  the  large  tragedies 
of  history  go  on.  We  in  our  blindness  would  again 

167 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


and  again  meet  the  situation  by  suppressing  one  of 
the  rival  forces.  That  is  not  Nature's  way :  wiser  than 
we,  who  would  destroy  life  in  the  saving  it,  she  goes 
on  adding  system  to  system,  claim  to  claim,  till, 
through  the  very  anguish  of  adjustment  and  coordin- 
ation, life  deepens  and  unfolds.  The  complexity  of 
the  physical  systems  which  control  us  does  but  cor- 
respond to  the  complexity  of  the  body.  The  lungs 
breathe  all  the  better  because  at  the  same  time  the 
heart  is  beating,  the  hair  growing,  and  digestion  going 
on.  Progress  consists  in  the  addition  of  new  functions. 
The  delicate  apparatus  may  easily  get  out  of  gear ; 
one  system  may  interfere  with  another.  This  is  not 
health,  but  disease,  equally  dangerous  whether  it  affect 
the  body  physical  or  the  body  politic.  But  it  cannot 
be  cured  by  retrogression  in  the  scale  of  being.  Health, 
physical,  mental,  or  social,  consists  in  the  harmonious 
interaction  of  a  number  of  activities  practically  unde- 
fined and  constantly  on  the  increase.  We  find  it  hard 
to  realize  the  full  wealth  of  our  own  nature,  but  there 
is  no  more  limit  to  the  loyalties  a  man  may  profess 
than  to  the  corporate  activities  he  may  share.  As 
Chesterton  remarks,  he  can  be  at  once  an  Englishman, 
a  collector  of  beetles,  a  Roman  Catholic,  and  an  en- 
thusiast for  cricket.  He  may  also  without  difficulty, 
when  once  adjustment  is  completed,  be  class-conscious, 
nation-conscious,  and  religion-conscious ;  the  more  his 
affiliations,  the  richer  his  possibilities,  for  through 
these  avenues  only  can  he  escape  from  the  prison  of 
self.  And  the  advent  on  a  large  scale  of  a  new  loyalty 

168 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


and  a  new  system  of  attraction  signals,  not  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  old,  but  the  enriching  of  all  social  life  and 
its  advance  to  a  higher  level  in  the  scale  of  being. 


Class-consciousness  then  can  be  dismissed  on  the 
score  neither  of  its  militant  implications,  nor  of  the 
menace  it  offers  to  older  devotions.  Both  in  its  political 
aspect  and  in  its  more  intimate  reaches  of  private  ex- 
perience, we  find  it  to  be  at  once  a  disciplinary  and  an 
awakening  force ;  it  kindles  and  restrains. 

But  now  we  must  go  further.  We  have  been  dwell- 
ing mainly  on  the  qualities  it  evokes,  and  the  oppor- 
tunities it  offers.  We  have  not  yet  asked  ourselves 
squarely  the  final,  the  crucial  question,  What  end  does 
it  propose? 

To  answer,  we  must  turn  from  its  inner  reactions 
to  its  outer  relations,  and  take  into  account  the  other 
combatants  in  the  class-war. 

By  common  consent,  the  term  class-conscious  is 
usually  applied  to  the  working  people.  But  in  accur- 
ate speech,  it  should  not  be  so  limited,  for  it  describes 
quite  as  truly  the  stubborn  struggle  of  the  employing 
class  to  maintain  supremacy.  The  persistence  of  this 
class  in  defending  its  prerogative  is  as  natural  a  prod- 
uct of  the  industrial  situation  as  the  pressure  of  the 
proletariat.  Why  is  not  the  emotion  as  right  and 
admirable  when  experienced  by  employer  as  by  em- 
ployed ? 

It  is  more  admirable,  many  will  hasten  to  reply. 
169 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


We  need  not  at  this  point  answer  the  obviously  parti- 
san cry.  But  if  we  are  to  convince  the  dispassionate 
man,  our  supposed  interlocutor,  that  our  own  cry  is  less 
partisan,  if  we  are  to  justify  that  strong  undertow  of 
sympathy  toward  the  popular  cause  of  which  we  spoke 
at  the  outset,  we  must  lean  on  an  instructive  assump- 
tion. This  is  the  conviction  that  the  time  when  the 
defense  of  prerogative  was  valuable  to  society  as  a 
whole  is  nearing  its  end,  and  that  the  ideal  of  the  pro- 
letariat, not  that  of  the  capitalist,  is  implicit  in  the 
truly  democratic  state. 

Do  we  or  do  we  not  want  to  put  an  end  to  class  in 
the  modern  sense?  This  is  the  real,  if  paradoxical  is- 
sue. The  situation  is  curious  and  interesting.  As  we 
have  already  hinted,  those  who  deplore  most  angrily 
the  rise  of  class-consciousness  in  the  proletariat  foster 
it  most  eagerly  in  their  own  camp,  and  would  with 
the  greatest  reluctance  see  class-distinctions  disappear. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  leaders  who  labor  most  ear- 
nestly to  strengthen  working-class  solidarity  do  so  be- 
cause they  hate  class  with  a  deadly  hatred,  and  see  in 
such  solidarity  the  only  means  of  putting  an  end  to  it 
altogether.  If  we  agree  with  them  to  the  point  of  hold- 
ing that  class,  like  war,  is  provisional,  it  would  seem 
that  these  are  the  people  to  whom  our  sympathy  is  due. 

Professor  Royce  has  well  shown  us  that  the  aim  of 
all  minor  loyalties  is  to  bring  us  under  tlhe  wing  of 
that  mother  of  all  virtues,  loyalty  to  the  Whole.  One 
draws  a  long  breath  at  this  grandiose,  appealing  image 
of  the  unachieved  end  of  all  human  striving.  Which 

170 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


serves  it  better,  —  socialism  with  its  class-conscious  con- 
notations, or  capitalism  with  its  repudiation  of  the 
new  bond  ?  The  question  implies  the  answer.  The  cap- 
italist movement  has  avowedly  no  aim  beyond  self- 
protection  and  the  maintenance  of  a  new  type  of  bene- 
volent feudalism.  The  working-class  movement,  on 
the  other  hand,  is  probably  the  only  form  of  group- 
consciousness  yet  evolved  in  history,  to  look  beyond 
its  own  corporate  aim.  It  is  inspired  by  a  passion  of 
good  will  for  all  men,  and  never  loses  sight  of  a  univer- 
sal goal.  Nay,  it  is  concerned  with  the  welfare  of  the 
very  enemies  whom  it  is  fighting,  for  it  is  aware  that 
rich  as  well  as  poor  are  to-day  so  fast  in  prison  that 
they  cannot  get  out.  Have  we  not  good  reason  then 
to  honor  it  and  to  exalt  it  above  even  patriotism  in 
our  thoughts  ? 

Frenchman  or  German  fighting  for  his  country  can 
rarely  indeed  look  beyond  that  country's  triumph. 
Modern  conflicts,  to  be  sure,  like  the  Boer  War  or  the 
American  struggle  in  the  Philippines,  have  a  trick  of 
self-deception  in  the  matter ;  this  is  both  amusing  and 
irritating,  yet  may  be  taken  to  mark  a  curious  advance 
from  the  honest  brutal  old  days,  when  it  occurred  to 
no  one  to  proffer  as  an  excuse  for  his  conduct  his  belief 
that  he  was  really  benefiting  his  enemy  !  Fundament- 
ally and  popularly,  though,  war  is  still  frankly  selfish. 
But  the  wider  outlook  which  it  does  occasionally  claim 
does  actually  exist,  in  the  case  of  class-conscious- 
ness. The  popular  movement  marches  to  the  tune  of 
Burns :  — 

171 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


It 's  coining  yet  for  a'  that 
That  man  to  man  the  warld  o'er 
Shall  brithers  be  for  a'  that. 

"  L'Internationale 
Sera  le  genre  humain,  —  " 

is  the  rallying  cry  of  the  people.  What  they  seek  is 
not  the  transfer  of  privilege,  but  the  abolition  of 
privilege ;  and  while  they  work  first  for  the  emanci- 
pation of  their  own  class,  they  believe  not  only  that 
this  class  comprises  the  majority  of  mankind,  but 
that  its  freedom  will  enable  all  men  alike  to  breathe 
a  more  liberal  air.  With  the  disappearance  of  privi- 
lege, all  possibility  of  the  class-war  would  of  course 
vanish,  for  the  very  sense  of  class  as  based  on  distinc- 
tion in  industrial  assets  and  opportunities  would  be 
replaced  by  new  groupings  founded,  one  would  sup- 
pose, on  more  subtle  and  intimate  affinities  of  pursuit, 
capacity,  and  taste.  In  all  history-creating  movements, 
the  urge  of  life  has  been  the  impelling  force  ;  nor 
can  we  deny  that  it  has  on  the  whole  worked  for  good 
to  the  whole  as  well  as  to  the  part.  But  it  is  the  great 
distinction  of  socialism  that,  while  frankly  accepting 
and  fostering  such  primal  passion,  it  is  at  the  same 
time  more  or  less  clearly  aware  of  a  more  disinterested 
aim.  Class  will  never  become  to  our  minds  a  permanent 
factor  in  social  life,  on  a  level  with  nation  or  country.  In 
this  fact  we  may  find  a  legitimate  reason  for  the  distrust 
of  class-consciousness  that  prevails.  But,  thinking 
more  deeply,  in  the  very  transitional  nature  of  class 
is  the  indorsement  and  justification  for  the  only  move- 

172 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


ment  which  is  to-day  setting  its  face  toward  the  de- 
struction of  class  distinctions,  and  which  has  thus  for 
its  very  object  the  annihilation  of  that  sense  of  sepa- 
rateness  which  as  a  weapon  it  must  temporarily  use. 

VI 

The  real  basis  of  our  faith  in  class-consciousness 
must  be  religious.  Its  awakening,  dependent  on  a 
maturing  of  the  economic  order,  was  dependent  also 
on  a  change  in  theological  thought.  The  epoch  of 
revolutions  swept  into  the  background  the  old  empha- 
sis on  original  sin  quite  as  surely  as  it  discredited 
asceticism ;  and  that  confidence  in  humanity  which 
as  a  result  overtook  the  surprised  world  is  not  only 
the  soul  of  democracy,  it  is  the  ultimate  justification 
of  class-consciousness.  It  does  more  than  carry  with 
it  a  faith  in  the  plain  people  :  it  relates  this  faith  to 
the  new  reverence  for  that  natural  order  to  which  it 
is  their  function  to  minister.  When  nature  and  the 
flesh  were  conceived  as  the  seat  of  hostility  to  the 
spirit  those  whose  energy  is  absorbed  in  physical  toil 
and  in  supplying  physical  needs  were  inevitably 
relegated  to  an  inferior  position  in  the  scheme 
of  things,  as  happened  from  the  time  of  Plato  on. 
Rising  to  the  modern  conception,  however,  granting 
that  the  very  physical  basis  of  life  has  its  sacra- 
mental sanctity,  we  should  ascribe  new  dignity  to 
those  who  maintain  this  basis  for  us,  and  should  be 
ready  as  never  before  to  hail  them  as  masters  of  the 
future.  Mazzini  did  well  when  he  turned  to  the  work- 

173 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


ers  as  the  hope  of  the  new  age  and  told  them  that 
their  duties  were  more*  important  than  their  rights : 
he  should  have  added,  that  in  claiming  their  rights 
they  are  performing  the  most  disinterested  of  duties, 
since  they  are  thereby  asserting  the  sacredness  in  the 
universe  of  functions  which  have  too  long  worn  the 
badge  of  servitude  but  which  are  in  truth  as  suffused 
with  spiritual  meaning  as  the  achievements  of  saint 
or  sage. 

Rising  to  this  altitude,  we  have  made  a  great  dis- 
covery ;  as  Moody's  lovely  lyric  has  it,  we  have  found 
a  sky  "  behind  the  sky."  The  materialistic  interpreta- 
tion of  history  tries  in  vain  to  hold  us  within  the  zone 
of  the  lower  heavens,  for  there  are  always  new  heavens 
waiting.  Nor  is  it  denied  us  to  fly  much  higher  than  we 
have  ventured  yet  into  the  upper  air  of  pure  spiritual 
passion.  We  have  done  full  justice  to  the  teaching 
that  expounds  the  importance  of  the  economic  base, 
and  vindicates  the  forces  rooted  in  economic  necessity 
and  self-interest.  We  have  shown,  too,  that  freedom 
has  its  place  in  directing  and  coloring  these  forces. 
But  another  question  is  waiting,  nor  can  we  close  with- 
out asking  once  more  whether  all  productive  forces  are 
directly  related  to  this  base,  or  whether  we  may  re- 
serve a  place  for  the  effective  power  of  pure  altruism. 

Whether  we  look  out  or  in,  the  question  for  most 
of  us  is  answered  in  the  asking.  Heroic  devotion 
springing  from  ranges  quite  out  of  the  economic  sphere 
fills  the  human  annals ;  and  this  not  least  in  the  case 
of  social  progress.  From  the  days  of  John  Ball  to 

174 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


those  of  John  Howard,  philanthropists  who  have 
waged  brave  successful  battle  against  abuses,  reformers 
who  have  lifted  the  general  life  to  a  higher  level,  have 
appeared  from  any  and  every  social  stratum,  drawing 
their  inspiration  from  depths  greater  than  class  can 
reach.  All  through  history,  the  pressure  of  the  unpriv- 
ileged toward  freedom  has  been  supplemented  at  criti- 
cal moments  by  the  undercurrent  of  sympathy  in  the 
hearts  of  the  privileged,  and  the  one  group  has  sup- 
plied leaders  to  the  other.  It  would  almost  seem  that 
the  socialist  movement  is  particularly  rich  in  such 
leaders.  Marx,  if  you  come  to  that,  was  not  a  working- 
man  ;  nor  Lassalle,  nor  Morris,  nor  Kropotkin,  nor 
many  another  who  in  prison  or  exile  has  proved  him- 
self true  to  the  worker's  cause.  Among  contemporary 
leaders  it  is  safe  to  say  that  the  large  majority  are 
from  the  middle  class.  Looking  at  the  high  proportion 
of  "  intellectuals "  among  effective  socialists,  one  is 
even  a  little  bewildered.  Yet  the  situation  is  simple. 
It  is  evident,  whatever  radicals  may  say  to  the  con- 
trary, that  if  the  proletariat  could  produce  its  own 
leaders  there  would  be  no  need  of  social  revolution. 

The  cry  of  the  dispossessed  is  compelling.  The 
working  classes  must  show  the  way  to  social  advance. 
They  alone,  free  from  sentimentality,  the  curse  of  the 
privileged,  and  from  abstract  theorizing,  the  curse  of 
the  scholastic,  have  that  grim  experience  of  the  reac- 
tion of  economic  conditions  on  the  majority  from 
which  right  judgment  can  be  born.  But  if  their  func- 
tion be  to  furnish  momentum,  and  corporate  wisdom, 

175 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


the  power  of  individual  initiative  and  directorship 
will  often  in  the  nature  of  things  be  generated  among 
those  governing  classes  in  whom  these  gifts  have  been 
fostered.  If  education  and  administrative  experience 
are  valuable  enough  to  share,  it  is  obvious  that  the 
dumb  proletariat  must  to  a  certain  extent  look  to  the 
classes  that  possess  them  for  the  revelation  of  its  own 
sealed  wisdom  and  the  guidance  of  its  confused  pow- 
ers. The  enlightened  energy  of  those  who  come  from 
other  groups  to  serve  it  should  not  be  slighted.  Their 
high  impulses,  their  rich  devotions,  are  also,  to  ulti- 
mate vision,  within,  not  without,  the  evolutionary 
process,  —  a  process  broader,  deeper  than  current 
Marxianism  admits.  In  them  that  wider  loyalty,  to- 
ward which  class-consciousness  itself  is  groping,  has 
been  born  already,  and  to  assert  that  they  have  no 
part  in  social  advance  and  that  the  working  class  must 
produce  unaided  the  new  society,  would  be  to  deny 
democracy  at  the  root. 

Ordinary  socialist  analysis  over-simplifies,  by  con- 
struing all  life  in  terms  of  class-psychology.  This 
psychology  has  been  foolishly  neglected.  But  man  is 
far  too  complex  to  be  controlled  by  class-feeling  alone. 
Class  takes  its  place  —  a  place  so  far  in  the  past  too 
little  recognized  —  beside  the  other  two  great  powers 
of  religion  and  of  race ;  there  is  no  reason  for  suppos- 
ing it  is  ever  to  supplant  them.  And  around  religion, 
race,  and  class  is  something  larger  to  which  in  last 
analysis  we  must  appeal,  —  that  general  life  in  which 
we  are  all  sharers.  This  in  the  long  run  is  the  con- 

176 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


straining  reality ;  this,  as  civilization  slowly,  painfully, 
inevitably  grows  democratic,  becomes  increasingly  the 
source  of  the  impulses  that  create  the  future.  In  giv- 
ing us  the  full  Freedom  of  this  City  of  the  Common 
Life  will  consist  the  final  and  crowning  work  of  demo- 
cracy. And  already  the  "  we "  who  labor  for  social 
righteousness  are  neither  exclusively  "  we  the  privi- 
leged "  nor  "  we  the  oppressed."  The  time  was,  when, 
like  Matthew  Arnold's  "remnant,"  we  were  few, 
baffled,  all  but  helpless.  As  the  days  pass  and  de- 
mocracy works  its  secret  silent  miracle,  our  numbers 
multiply,  and  we  dare  to  lift  our  eyes  and  proclaim 
ourselves  victorious  heirs  of  the  Kingdom  of  Good  Will 
to  be. 

This  all  Americans  know  in  theory.  Let  us  beware 
lest  we  disprove  it  in  deed,  by  withholding  our  faith 
from  that  great  class  movement  of  the  working  people, 
which  alone  holds  in  practical  and  effective  form  the 
ideal  of  a  world  where  divisions  based  on  arbitrary 
economic  accident  shall  be  obliterated,  and  life  be 
lifted  to  new  levels  of  freedom.  The  instinctive  sym- 
pathy with  proletarian  movements  should  cast  aside 
timidity  and  incertitude,  and  realize  how  deep  its 
roots  strike  into  the  true  philosophic  and  religious 
conception  of  social  advance.  So  only  can  the  effective 
reality  of  our  modern  assumptions  be  vindicated,  and 
the  Greater  Loyalty  become  master  of  the  world.  For 
the  powers  of  progress  which  are  working  their  slow 
sure  way  to  victory  spring  from  two  sources :  First, 
and  more  obviously,  from  the  primal  urge  of  life  for 

177 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


self-realization  :  then  from  that  more  profound  source, 
equally  though  less  obviously  part  of  the  natural 
order,  the  undying  passion  for  self -obliteration  and 
sacrifice.  Only  when  the  two  forces  act  in  harmony 
can  progress  be  sane  and  sound.  But  the  powers  of 
sacrifice  must  learn  the  ancient  lesson:  if  they  are 
to  be  saved  and  saviors,  their  life  must  be  lost  that  it 
may  be  found.  Their  ardor  and  purity  are  what  lift 
us  from  the  brutes  toward  the  angels.  Yet  their  too 
frequent  helplessness  in  the  past  to  affect  the  trend 
of  things  should  teach  them  wisdom.  If  they  would 
be  operative  to  any  extent  in  the  social  field,  they 
must  subordinate  themselves  to  the  more  massive 
though  not  more  normal  forces  to  which  the  age  gives 
birth.  So  may  they  have  their  share  in  translating 
what  life  offers  into  a  higher  likeness.  So  may  we  all 
attain  a  courage  that  is  never  fatuous,  a  wisdom  that 
is  never  academic.  For  we  shall  gain  the  ability  to 
read  an  Intention  greater  than  our  own,  expressed 
not  in  the  abstruse  language  of  theological  mystery, 
but  in  the  warm  if  terrible  terms  of  this  ever-chang- 
ing universe,  our  home.  "  A  Body  hast  Thou  prepared 
for  me,"  wrote  the  psalmist  in  old  days,  inspired  and 
exalted  by  the  vision  of  sacrifice.  In  the  trend  toward 
socialism,  in  the  rise  of  the  proletariat,  in  all  the 
grim  and  repellent  reality  of  the  class-struggle,  would 
seem  to  be  the  Body  evidently  prepared  for  us  of  the 
twentieth  century.  Into  this  Body,  it  is  our  high  part 
to  infuse  what  soul  we  will.  The  task  is  difficult  as 
great.  Those  who  have  courage  to  risk  a  great  Adven- 

178 


CLASS-CONSCIOUSNESS 


ture  of  Faith,  and  those  only,  can  rise  to  the  oppor- 
tunity and  in  the  spirit  of  solemn  consecration  give 
the  old  and  ever  new  response :  "  Lo,  I  come,  to  do 
Thy  Will,  O  Lord." 

VII 

We  have  probed  the  assumptions  of  socialism,  and 
now  we  are  ready  to  turn  to  its  promises.  Economic 
determinism  and  class-consciousness  turn  out  to  belong 
to  the  large  and  respected  family  of  the  Bogies :  the 
interpretation  of  history  which  the  first  implies  is  just 
as  much  and  just  as  little  materialistic  as  the  modern 
interpretation  of  nature,  and  the  second,  with  all  its 
repellent  features,  actually  promises  to  lead  us  into 
that  region  beyond  classes  of  which  idealism  has  always 
dreamed. 

I  wish  that  my  room  had  a  floor, 
I  don't  so  much  care  for  a  door,  — 
But  this  crawling  around 
Without  touching  the  ground 
Is  getting  to  be  quite  a  bore. 

So  runs  the  plaintive  ditty  of  the  sentimentalist.  The 
earlier  socialist  school  might  well  have  sung  it,  but  the 
doctrines  of  economic  determinism  and  the  class-strug- 
gle have  put  a  firm  floor  beneath  socialism  at  last. 

Now  that 'our  first  scruples  are  quieted,  however,  others 
at  once  arise  to  take  their  place.  Some  unfortunate 
mortals,  mournfully  apprehensive  that  socialism  is  on 
the  way,  expect  to  hate  it.  If  we  hold  this  uncomfortable 
position,  we  had  better  fight  the  progress  of  the  new 

179 


FIRST  PRINCIPLES 


creed,  if  only  with  the  bitter  energy  of  those  who  de- 
fend lost  causes.  It  is  all  very  well  to  consider  the 
cooperative  commonwealth  probable :  unless  we  also 
consider  it  desirable,  we  shall  soon  find  ourselves  in 
as  false  an  attitude  as  the  sad  believers  in  the  divine 
right  of  kings,  who  lingered  through  the  epoch  of 
revolutions,  and  are  still  to  be  found  in  obscure  cor- 
ners, burning  incense  to  the  memory  of  King  Charles 
the  Martyr. 

Let  us  betake  us,  then,  to  a  discussion  of  the  ethical 
reactions  of  socialism,  so  far  as  we  can  foresee  them ; 
for  however  socialists  may  sneer  at  prophecy,  none  of 
them  dispense  with  it ;  and  the  forecasting  imagination 
has  a  large  part  to  play  in  piling  up  the  socialist  vote. 


PART  HI 
THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 


PART  III.  THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 
CHAPTER  I 

"FREE    BECAUSE    IMBOUND " 


LET  no  one  delude  himself  that  the  acceptance 
of  economic  determinism  justifies  him  in  lying  back 
lazily  while  he  watches  destiny  fulfill  itself  and  the 
class-struggle  take  its  course.  The  advocates  of  the 
doctrine  sometimes  use  a  language  which  would  logic- 
ally reduce  our  actions  to  the  helpless  circling  of  star- 
dust,  and  a  Shelley  may  even  get  poetry  out  of  this 
kind  of  thing.  In  the.  "Prometheus  Unbound"  an 
exquisite  little  lyric  of  fatalism  accompanies  as  a 
chant  the  progress  through  the  world  of  the  redeem- 
ing Spirit  of  Love  :  — 

Those  who  saw 

Say,  from  the  breathing  earth  behind 
There  streams  a  plume-uplifting  wind 
Which  drives  them  on  their  path,  while  they 
Believe  their  own  swift  wings  and  feet 
The  sweet  desires  within  obey. 

A  delicate  phrasing  of  a  bitter  doctrine :  and  it  is 
true  that  the  wise,  who  see,  behold •  the  "plume-up- 
lifting wind  "  streaming  from  the  earth,  awakening 
the  destined,  and  bearing  them  on  toward  waiting 
heights,  despite  their  assurance  that  "sweet  desires 

183 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

within "  impel  them.  The  more  one  contemplates 
history,  the  larger  does  the  role  of  necessity  appear. 
None  the  less  are  wings  as  well  as  wind  essential  to 
purposeful  flight.  Every  scrap  of  socialist  propaganda, 
like  all  other  human  activity,  witnesses  to  the  instinct- 
ive disregard  of  fatalism  by  the  mind.  When  Marx 
uttered  his  thrilling  call,  "  Proletarians  of  all  lands, 
unite ! "  it  was  a  call  to  free  men. 

True,  when  we  assume  our  power  to  affect  social 
progress,  we  may  be  under  a  great  delusion.  So  we 
may  in  behaving  as  if  we  moved  at  will  in  space, 
while  really  an  incredible  weight  of  atmosphere  is 
pressing  from  every  point  upon  us.  Yet  it  would  be 
foolish  to  worry  about  that  weight  when  we  are  catch- 
ing a  trolley :  fatalistic  ideas,  whether  they  attack  us 
from  the  side  of  theology,  science  or  sociology,  are 
best  cheerfully  disregarded  the  moment  we  enter  the 
race  of  life. 

In  every  historic  crisis,  external  or  intellectual, 
we  may  discern  at  once  the  control  of  unescapable 
fate  and  the  directing  power  of  the  free  spirit.  It  is 
true,  as  our  quotation  from  a  New  York  paper  stated, 
that  slavery  in  the  United  States  could  not,  in  the 
nature  of  things  industrial  and  political,  have  endured 
many  generations  more :  it  is  true  that  evolutionary 
theory  was  bound  to  come,  whether  Darwin  had  been 
born  or  not.  Does  his  name  or  the  name  of  Lincoln 
therefore  lose  in  glory?  Let  us  say  rather  that  to 
the  great  movements  of  which  they  were  the  instru- 
ments, these  men  were  exactly  what  the  force  of 

184 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


the  will  is  to  that  bewildering  resultant  of  interac- 
tions which  constitutes  a  person.  Elements  of  which 
we  are  but  dimly  aware,  focused  in  the  will  at  a 
given  moment,  unite  to  energize  it  into  conscious 
purpose.  So  at  historic  junctures  the  needs  of  the 
race  find  their  focus  in  agents  quite  unaware  of  the 
deep  necessity  that  works  through  them.  Thus  our 
reverence  for  the  heroes  of  the  race  is  not  weakened 
but  enhanced  by  true  reading  of  the  inevitable  trend 
of  things.  What  is  that  trend,  after  all,  but  the 
"tendency  not  ourselves,  by  which  all  things  seek  to 
fulfill  the  law  of  their  being"?  Be  it  remembered 
that  this  famous  definition  was  meant  to  define,  not 
the  economic  necessity  of  the  socialists,  but  the  Eter- 
nal worshiped  by  the  Hebrews.  To  the  grown  child 
as  to  the  small,  Law  may  well  be  another  name  for 
Parental  Will,  and  such  law,  which  in  one  sense  de- 
termines all  our  efforts,  yet  finds  its  best  triumph  in 
our  free  activity. 

Determinism,  then,  simply  puts  civilization  under 
that  reign  of  law  which  it  is  always  open  to  us  to  con- 
strue as  the  reign  of  love.  It  assures  us  that  the  threads 
of  moral  purpose  are  knit  into  the  woof  of  the  uni- 
verse instead  of  trailing  vacuously  through  space.  The 
postulates  of  socialism  are  as  susceptible  of  religious 
interpretation  as  the  postulates  of  nature,  and  just 
as  we  have  deeper  faith  in  the  spirituality  of  the 
world  than  the  old  belief  in  special  creations  could  in- 
spire in  our  fathers,  so  our  children  may  find  the 
privilege  of  cooperating  with  the  Will  revealed  in  the 

185 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  CHARACTER 

changing  order,  to  be  higher  than  the  attempt  to  im- 
pose on  that  order  methods  or  plans  of  their  own  in- 
vention. As  soon  as  we  escape  our  old  arrogance,  the 
role  of  freedom  can  hardly  be  too  strongly  stressed. 
Paradoxical  though  it  seems,  we  can  become  intelli- 
gent co-workers  with  destiny  only  when  we  abandon 
belief  that  we  are  responsible  for  creating  it.  And 
because  men  are  learning  this,  social  evolution  begins 
to-day  to  include,  as  it  has  never  done  before,  the  fac- 
tor of  foresight  and  conscious  purpose,  —  a  gain  com- 
pared with  which  the  conquests  of  science  appear  in- 
significant. Consciousness,  which  in  last  analysis  must 
always  find  itself  in  terms  of  free  purpose,  is  the  final 
blossoming  of  both  physical  and  economic  life.  Cut 
the  flowers  of  will  and  purpose,  whether  to  put  them 
in  glass  with  the  idealist,  or  to  throw  them  on  the 
ash-heap  with  the  extreme  Marxian,  and  growth  will 
perish.  But  let  the  Mazzinis,  the  Tolstoys  of  the  fu- 
ture simply  look  to  it  that  their  fragrant  dreams  be 
rooted  in  the  soil  of  reality,  and  the  day  of  rich  har- 
vestings will  be  sped. 

"  Cercando  liberta  "  was  Dante's  motto  ;  and  it  is 
still  our  own.  We  shall  compass  that  liberty  which  is 
forever  the  end  of  the  ceaseless  human  quest,  only  in  such 
measure  as  we  penetrate  the  meaning  of  Wordsworth's 
noble  phrase,  and  come  to  know  ourselves  "  free  be- 
cause unbound." 

Moral  and  natural  forces  are  thus  in  perpetual  in- 
terplay ;  and  as  we  enter  our  discussion  of  the  reac- 
tion of  socialism  on  character,  the  first  thing  to  say 

186 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


is  that  character  is  sure  to  react  on  socialism  in  turn. 
The  success  and  stability  of  any  civilization  depend 
on  the  degree  to  which  it  expresses  the  realities  of 
the  psychical  life.  The  socialist  state  may  be  coming 
through  forces  beyond  our  control ;  but  it  will  take  the 
best  manhood  we  have  to  run  it  successfully  when  it 
gets  here. 

For  should  socialistn  arrive  otherwise  than  as  the 
result  of  an  inward  transformation,  affecting  the  deep 
springs  of  will  and  love,  it  would  prove  the  worst 
disaster  of  any  experiment  in  collective  living  that  the 
world  has  seen.  Matthew  Arnold,  wisest  of  Victorian 
critics,  pointed  out  years  ago  the  perils  with  which  the 
advance  of  democracy  is  fraught,  unless  it  be  achieved 
through  a  common  enlightenment  and  a  pervading 
social  passion.  Socialism  is  democracy  pushed  to  an 
extreme.  It  would  involve  immensely  elaborated 
machinery.  Unless  the  spirit  of  the  living  creature 
be  in  the  wheels,  one  foresees  them  grinding  destruc- 
tion. Should  the  cooperative  commonwealth  be  other 
than  the  expression  of  a  general  will  very  different 
from  that  of  to-day,  it  would  be  an  unbearable  tyranny. 
The  only  comfort  is  that  it  could  not  endure.  It 
might  quite  conceivably  be  ushered  in  suddenly,  forced 
by  revolution  or  by  the  proletariat  vote  on  an  unpre- 
pared world  which  had  undergone  no  inner  change ; 
it  could  never  be  so  maintained.  For  no  social  order 
can  be  even  relatively  stable  if  mechanically  intro- 
duced. It  must  be  a  growth ;  and  growth  has  to  root 
deeply  under-ground  before  it  shows  much  in  the 

187 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

light  of  day.  No  one  could  enforce  laws  against  stealing 
in  a  community  in  which  two  thirds  of  the  citizens 
had  kleptomania.  Picturing  a  social  democracy  intro- 
duced by  violence,  with  its  ranks  of  reluctant  citizens 
undergoing  the  industrial  conscription,  and  of  auto- 
cratic officials  running  a  state  enemy  to  all  free  self- 
expression,  one  perceives  the  very  "  coming  slavery  " 
of  standard  dread.  The  critics  who  echo  Spencer 
down  the  decades  are  right  enough  from  their  point 
of  view :  far  more  right,  in  any  case,  than  the  old- 
fashioned  doubters  who  saw  in  socialism  a  future  riot 
of  license. 

II 

The  truth  is  that  we  are  forced  to  agree  with  our 
tedious  friends  who  insist  that  we  must  "  alter  human 
nature  "  if  socialism  is  to  be  a  success. 

But  is  the  prospect  so  staggering?  Call  history  to 
the  witness-stand !  Human  nature  alters  perpetually, 
before  our  very  eyes.  The  stuff  is  malleable,  nay,  fluid, 
and  its  changes  are  the  soul  of  progress.  A  moral 
transformation  has  accompanied  every  new  social  order 
since  the  story  of  the  race  began.  Each  vanishing  civ- 
ilization has  been  at  once  cause  and  product  of  distinct 
ethical  types.  Nomadic  life  yields  to  agricultural; 
states  rise  and  fall ;  a  great  imperialism  gathers  the 
nations  into  its  folds,  disintegrates,  disappears;  a 
feudal  system  rises,  thrives,  decays.  Last  in  the  series, 
up  to  date,  capitalistic  industrialism  follows,  and  con- 
trols the  world.  The  imagination,  brooding  on  these 

188 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


various  social  orders,  recognizes  them  less  by  their 
outward  traits  than  by  the  personal  types  which  they 
produced.  The  consciousness  of  those  delightful  young 
Athenians,  disciples  of  Socrates,  friends  of  Plato,  is 
what  first  rises  to  thought  when  Greece  is  mentioned. 
That  consciousness  created  Greece  as  much  as  Greece 
created  it.  It  differed  from  the  mind  of  the  Puritan 
as  that  differs  from  the  mind  of  the  man  on  the  street 
to-day,  and  both  from  the  mind  of  the  Napoleonic 
general. 

When  once  the  mental  eye  awakes  to  this  vision 
of  ceaseless  flux,  the  moral  products  of  the  old  order 
suddenly  appear  incidental.  Our  discussion  has  not 
yet  brought  us  to  accept  the  moral  connotations  of 
socialism.  But  we  must  already  agree  with  the  social- 
ists that  the  moral  order,  for  instance,  of  those  Ages 
of  Faith  to  which  the  religious  mind  turns  for  its 
most  convincing  argument,  was  the  ethical  correlate 
of  a  civilization  irretrievably  passed.  The  ideals  of 
the  Middle  Ages  have  vanished  with  the  feudal  sys- 
tem ;  they  were  the  invisible  counterpart  of  castles 
and  cathedrals,  of  Arthurian  romance,  primitive  paint- 
ings, and  similar  delights.  To  the  moderns  who  nod 
easy  assent,  yet  hesitate  to  bid  farewell  to  the  present 
hour,  we  must  whisper  "  De  te  Fabula."  We  can  be 
sure  of  only  one  thing  concerning  our  industrial  and 
competitive  civilization,  and  that  is,  that  its  hour  will 
strike.  As  the  Age  of  Violence  was  succeeded  by  the 
Age  of  Greed,  so  the  Age  of  Greed  will  be  succeeded 
by  some  other  age,  in  which  neither  physical  force  nor 

189 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

commercial  cleverness  will  be  the  keynote  of  the  per- 
sonal ideal.  As  of  the  bad,  so  of  the  good :  the  condi- 
tions which  have  produced  a  Jane  Addams  or  a  Lord 
Shaftesbury  are  as  surely  passing  as  those  have  passed 
which  produced  a  Francis  or  a  Benedict.  Emphases 
change  as  the  ages  go ;  ideals  shape  themselves  like 
clouds,  and  like  clouds  depart.  Now  these  virtues,  now 
those,  are  fostered:  now  these  sins,  now  those,  run 
rank.  The  pioneer  in  that  almost  untried  science,  evo- 
lutionary psychology,  has  a  fascinating  field  before 
him. 

So  dramatic  is  this  moral  shifting,  that  the  virtues 
of  one  age  sometimes  become  the  vices  of  another.  In 
the  days  of  chivalry,  the  most  popular  virtue  was  to 
run  at  your  neighbor,  spear  in  hand,  when  you  met 
him  on  the  road,  and  cheerfully  to  knock  him  off  his 
horse,  in  accordance  with  a  courteous  code  of  etiquette. 
We  do  not  approve  of  this  practice  to-day,  and  chiv- 
alry is  gone.  A  new  ethics  has  replaced  it.  The  most 
popular  virtue  now  is  to  accumulate  money  enough  to 
educate  one's  family  decorously,  with  a  surplus  on 
which  to  be  generous,  —  though  by  so  doing  one  push 
one's  neighbor's  family  to  the  wall.  Further  contem- 
plating modern  ideals,  we  note  that  this  central  virtue 
of  Acquisitiveness  is  surrounded  by  attendant  nymphs  : 
Thrift,  Energy,  and  Foresight.  Certain  old-fashioned 
traits  once  considered  to  be  virtues  are  now  commonly 
counted  to  men  for  vices.  Non-resistance,  for  example, 
now  considered  cowardice  in  men  or  states  ;  meekness, 
to-day  usually  spelled  weakness ;  taking  no  thought 

190 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


for  the  morrow,  now  known  as  improvidence ;  unworldli- 
ness,  now  generally  viewed  as  a  phase  of  sentimental- 
ity. A  perfunctory  verbal  admiration  is  accorded  these 
qualities  in  some  quarters,  but  no  one  looking  straight 
at  life  can  fail  to  see  that  the  person  who  allowed  them 
to  rule  his  conduct  consistently  and  exclusively,  would 
not  only  be  likely  to  ruin  the  lives  of  those  dear  to 
him,  but  would  in  the  long  run  become  a  public  charge. 
In  all  seriousness,  the  virtues  fostered  and  applauded 
by  our  present  commercial  civilization  are  the  self- 
regarding  ones.  Many  subtle  causes  have  conspired 
during  the  last  hundred  and  twenty-five  years  to  pro- 
duce an  ideal  in  which  militant  violence  is  at  a  discount 
and  force  is  replaced  by  greed,  but  in  which  the  indi- 
vidual is  the  centre  more  exclusively  than  in  any  pre- 
ceding phase  of  history,  and  the  defense  of  personal 
rights  in  an  indifferent  or  hostile  world  is  the  first 

O 

canon  of  duty.  Till  this  canon  is  satisfied,  all  else 
must  be  deferred.  A  glance  at  a  literary  authority, 
the  novels  of  Thackeray,  shows  the  difference  of  at- 
mosphere between  a  non-commercial  society  like  that 
pictured  in  his  eighteenth-century  story,  "  Henry  Es- 
mond," and  the  thoroughly  commercialized  Victorian 
world  of  "  The  Newcomes."  Between  the  two  epochs, 
the  Industrial  Revolution  had  intervened.  It  had 
handicapped  at  the  outset  all  but  the  very  few  born  to 
privilege  of  wealth  or  capacity,  and  at  the  same  time 
it  had  thrown  on  every  individual  the  onus  of  creating 
his  own  place  in  the  economic  scheme.  What  more 
ingenious  system  could  be  devised,  to  blast  unworldli- 

191 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

ness  ?  By  the  employer  who  scrutinizes  the  output  of 
the  laborer  to  the  last  atom,  as  by  the  workman  who 
tosses  aside  his  tools  at  the  stroke  of  the  clock,  the 
scales  of  justice  are  so  fiercely  watched  and  narrowly 
balanced  that  all  the  more  selfless  qualities  which 
should  play  their  part  in  creating  values  draw  back 
affrighted.  This  state  of  things  grows  more  acute  year 
by  year.  The  moral  code  which  emerges,  approved 
and  enticing,  is  one  in  which  integrity  is  at  least  nom- 
inally honored,  and  justice,  far  from  being  nominally 
ignored,  is  loudly  invoked ;  but  is  also  one  in  which 
alertness  and  prudence,  energy  and  practical  judgment, 
point  the  way  to  victory,  while  mercy,  humility,  and 
indifference  to  personal  gain  spell  social  failure  and 
breed  contempt. 

Is  this  instinct  of  defiant  self-protection  destined 
always  to  remain  the  master-passion  in  the  social  struct- 
ure? Surely  not  in  its  present  form.  What  the  empha- 
sis in  the  new  age  will  be  we  cannot  know  with  cer- 
tainty. It  is  always  the  unexpected  that  happens,  and 
the  forces  that  control  history  work  out  into  surprising 
results,  spiritual  and  external.  We  use  the  term  social- 
ism as  a  sort  of  algebraic  expression,  ignorant  what 
truth  may  lie  behind  the  symbol.  Algebraic  formulae, 
however,  do  truly  express  laws  of  relation  ;  and  the 
f ormula3  of  socialism  legitimately  enable  us  to  forecast 
certain  results  in  the  future  order,  to  be  expected  on 
the  ethical  side  of  the  equation  between  economics  and 
morals. 


192 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


III 

The  first  important  matter  to  dwell  upon  is  the 
probable  modification  of  freedom,  in  that  socialist  civil- 
ization in  which  many  timid  souls  foresee  a  mechanical 
bureaucracy.  A  suggestive  historic  summary  by  Fer- 
dinand Lassalle  may  help  us  at  the  outset :  — 

The  ancient  world,  and  also  the  mediaeval  period  down 
to  the  French  Revolution  of  1789,  sought  human  solidarity 
and  community  in  bondage,  or  subjection. 

The  Revolution,  and  the  historical  period  controlled  by 
it,  rightly  incensed  at  this  subjection,  sought  freedom  in  the 
dissolution  of  all  solidarity  and  community.  Thereby,  how- 
ever, it  gained  not  freedom,  but  license,  because  freedom 
without  community  is  license. 

The  new,  the  present  period,  seeks  solidarity  in  freedom. 

Which  is  to  grant  with  Carlyle,  that  "  liberty  requires 
new  definitions."  The  strict  preservation  of  individual 
freedom  has  been  the  chief  watchword  of  that  compet- 
itive and  capitalistic  order  from  which  we  are  just 
emerging.  So  far  as  we  can  see,  the  incoherent  forces 
now  at  work  —  the  slow  sure  growth  of  proletarian 
class-consciousness,  the  consolidation  of  industry,  the 
spread  of  social  compunction  —  converge  toward  a 
centralization  of  power  and  an  equalization  of  wealth 
likely  to  impose  sharp  checks  on  such  freedom.  Per- 
haps it  is  true  that  capitalism  gained  "  not  freedom 
but  license " :  but  to  seek  freedom  in  community,  or 
solidarity  in  freedom,  is  a  process  which  will  call  for 
many  readjustments.  The  functions  and  privileges  of 

193 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  common  life  will  assume  an  importance  which  we 
can  hardly  imagine ;  many  enterprises  now  run  for 
private  profit  will  be  run  for  public  good ;  many  incen- 
tives to  work,  now  operative,  will  be  limited  or  with- 
drawn. The  individual,  in  a  word,  will  find  his  outward 
life  prepared  for  him  in  advance,  to  a  degree  greater 
than  happens  to  any  one  to-day  except  proletarians  or 
hereditary  legislators.  The  reactions  of  such  a  state  of 
things  on  the  interior  life  must  inevitably  be  radical 
and  profound ;  and  we  could  hardly  describe  them  bet- 
ter than  by  a  fresh  application  of  our  chapter-heading. 
For  the  first  patent  factor  in  the  situation  is  that 
socialism  is  going  to  bring  with  it  a  penetrating  disci- 
pline, perhaps  the  most  universal  in  pressure  of  any 
that  history  has  evolved.  "  Doing  as  one  likes,"  that 
distinctively  British  ideal  flouted  of  Arnold,  will  be 
at  a  discount.  In  important  and  new  respects,  we 
shall  all  have  to  do  what  the  State  likes.  We  shall 
have  to  acquiesce  in  laws  of  life  and  labor  that  may 
inhibit  impulse  and  check  achievement  at  a  thousand 
unsuspected  points.  We  shall  want  to  go  a-fishing; 
the  stern  necessities  of  the  industrial  conscription  will 
stand  in  the  way.  Our  tastes  may  lie  in  farming,  and 
an  over-supply  of  farmers  reported  from  Government 
may  send  us  behind  the  counter.  We  may  feel  within 
us  the  capacity  to  accumulate  millions  and  bounteously 
to  scatter  them  abroad ;  matters  will  be  so  managed 
that  neither  our  generosity  nor  our  acquisitiveness  can 
have  free  scope.  All  this,  of  course,  on  the  assumption 
that  we  now  belong  to  those  privileged  classes,  the 

194 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


members  of  which  have  such  really  choice  tastes  to 
indulge,  and  who  do  so  very  much  like  to  suit  them- 
selves. The  chaotic  independence  that  we  now  enjoy 
will  vanish  like  a  mist,  replaced  by  an  orderly  social 
organization  in  which  individuality,  trammeled  in  va- 
rious ways  where  it  is  now  free,  will  have  to  express 
itself,  if  at  all,  through  new  channels. 

And  in  all  probability  we  shall  not  enjoy  this  con- 
dition of  things  at  all.  Distaste  for  discipline  is  innate 
in  the  human  breast.  We  all  wail  in  unison  with  the 
little  boy  in  "  Peter  Pan,"  who  cries,  "  I  don't  want  to 
take  my  bath ! "  as  good  Nana  trots  him  sternly  to 
the  tub.  Certainly,  the  present  world  affords  an  espe- 
cially bad  introduction  to  that  future  state.  For  never 
was  there  a  period  which  so  shrank  from  disciplines 
and  restrictions  of  every  kind,  and  so  far  succeeded  in 
throwing  them  off,  as  the  nineteenth  and  twentieth 
centuries.  See  where  we  stand  to-day!  The  churches 
have  candidly  abandoned  all  disciplinary  functions: 
a  religion  of  good-humor  has  taken  the  place  of  the 
old  religion  of  fear :  nay,  the  horror  of  discipline  has 
led  to  the  foundation  of  a  new  popular  faith,  which 
regards  pain,  not  as  a  taskmaster,  but  as  an  illusion. 
Ethical  restraints,  especially  in  the  matter  of  marriage, 
are  weakening  with  the  religious.  The  substitution  of 
indulgence  for  discipline  in  the  education  of  children, 
and  the  triumphant  march  of  the  free  elective  system, 
point  the  same  way ;  while  until  very  lately  restraints 
on  "individual  enterprise"  in  the  industrial  sphere 
were  viewed  with  keen  suspicion. 

195 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

This  relaxation  of  discipline,  in  the  name  of  free- 
dom and  of  natural  good,  which  has  been  going  on 
ever  since  the  Revolutionary  upheaval,  has  resulted  in 
a  curious  state  of  things.  Many  a  critic,  from  Car- 
lyle  down,  has  not  hesitated  to  describe  modern  life  as 
an  organized  anarchy.  To-day,  the  outcry  against  so- 
cial restraint  in  any  form  still  rises  vigorously,  from 
dramatists  and  philosophers  as  well  as  from  the  man 
in  the  street,  and  Spencer's  lugubrious  prophecy  of 
the  bureaucratic  tyranny  threatened  by  socialism  still 
finds  many  an  echo.  At  the  same  time,  he  who  lis- 
tens can  hear  an  increasing  volume  of  voices  in  a  dif- 
ferent song.  For  Carlyle,  with  his  bewildered  cry, 
"  Wanted,  an  autocrat,"  was  only  the  first  prophet  of 
a  strong  reaction.  A  line  of  thinkers  down  the  dec- 
ades has  protested  against  the  riot  of  individualism, 
and  demanded  a  principle  of  effective  authority  for  the 
salvation  of  the  modern  world.  Comparatively  late, 
Mr.  Irving  Babbitt 1  ably  points  out  the  intellectual 
laxity  that  has  resulted  from  the  sway  of  humanitari- 
anism  in  its  two  phases,  —  inaugurated,  so  he  says,  by 
Bacon  and  Rousseau,  —  the  extension  of  knowledge 
and  the  extension  of  sympathy.  He  shows  with  convinc- 
ing logic  how  humanitarianism  slips  either  into  senti- 
mentality or  into  scientific  accumulation,  in  neither 
of  which  is  found  that  power  to  train  in  selection  and  t 
judgment  which  is  the  basis  of  sound  education..  Mr. 
Babbitt  would  propose  to  restore  this  decaying  power 
by  a  revival  of  humanistic  and  classical  training  in 
1  In  Literature  and  the  American  College. 
196 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


schools  and  colleges.  One  indorses  and  applauds,  per- 
ceiving at  the  same  time  that  there  is  small  chance  of 
effectively  restoring  the  intellectual  disciplines  in  a  so- 
ciety where  the  moral  disciplines  are  undermined.  The 
educational  world  does  but  reflect  in  its  tendencies  the 
larger  world  without.  Contemplating  the  relaxation  of 
all  effectual  restraints  that  has  gone  on  for  over  a  hun- 
dred years,  one  is  assured  that  a  change  more  pro- 
found than  a  revival  of  classical  studies  will  be  needed, 
if  the  world  is  to  become  in  the  good  old  sense  a 
school  for  character. 

Nor  can  this  needed  discipline  ever  be  regained  by 
mere  revivals  of  any  kind.  History  does  not  repeat 
itself.  Carlyle's  hero-autocrat  will  never  bless  our  eyes 
again.  He  has  gone  with  the  feudal  system,  and  it 
may  be  feared  that  the  classical  curriculum  has  disap- 
peared with  him,  to  be  "  happy  in  the  past." 

What,  then,  if  we  looked  forward  ?  What  if  the 
prophesied  tyranny  of  th,e  socialist  state,  being  ful- 
filled, should  prove  itself  to  be  not  curse  but  bless- 
ing? It  is  possible,  at  least.  The  humanitarian  move- 
ment, which  is  surely  one  of  the  main  currents  sweeping 
us  toward  socialism,  may  in  time  become  humane. 
Through  all  vapors  of  sentimentality  and  materialism,, 
it  may  flow  on  and  out  into  a  clearer  air.  Out  of  its 
own  necessities  it  may  generate  that  power  to  restrain, 
select,  subdue,  in  which  modern  civilization  most  clearly 
fails.  The  discipline  supplied  by  socialism  may  con- 
ceivably prove  to  be  that  very  discipline  competent 
to  shape  human  life  to  nobler  likeness,  for  which  our 

197 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

wisest  clamor ;  and  when  the  "  coming  slavery  "  is  here, 
we  may  find  in  it  that  service  which  is  perfect  freedom. 

But  only  on  one  condition :  that  this  authority, 
with  the  discipline  it  entails,  be  the  result  of  the  gen- 
eral and  enlightened  will  of  the  community.  That  old 
terror  felt  by  religion  lest  the  voluntary  element  be 
sacrificed  in  the  proposed  socialist  order,  must  be  in- 
dorsed with  all  our  hearts.  Virtue  established  by  rote 
would  be  no  virtue  at  all.  Autocracy  is  one  thing, 
however ;  voluntary  self-control  is  another.  Better  our 
present  chaos  than  a  state  without  poverty  or  disease, 
established  against  the  free  will  of  its  members  !  A 
"benevolent  despotism"  imposed  from  outside,  no 
matter  how  excellent  its  results,  is  repudiated  by  the 
spirit  of  democracy  ;  but  discipline  self-imposed  is  the 
first  requisite  of  noble  manhood.  Limit  personal  inde- 
pendence through  external  tyranny  of  mob  or  czar, 
you  produce  the  slave ;  limit  it  by  the  choice  of  the 
common  will,  you  gain  thew  only  citizen  who  is  truly 
free.  The  advance  of  civilization  is  measured  by  its 
self-imposed  restrictions.  Already  to-day,  such  restric- 
tions for  the  sake  of  the  social  welfare  are  thickening 
on  every  hand.  We  may  no  longer  spit  in  the  street- 
cars, nor  take  more  than  a  given  number  of  lodgers 
to  the  cubic  feet  of  air  that  we  control.  In  countless 
matters  the  enlightened  conscience  is  limiting  its  prero- 
gatives, in  that  spirit  of  joy  which  transforms  sacrifice 
from  mutilation  to  redemption. 

The  one  chance  for  the  well-being  of  the  great 
coming  experiment  to  which,  apparently,  we  are  all 

198 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


but  committed,  is  that  it  shall  express  a  general  aspi- 
ration and  a  common  choice.  We  may  as  well  be  frank. 
Socialism  is  going  to  mean  a  new  degree  of  author- 
ity, not  over  this  class  or  that  class,  but  over  every  last 
man.  And  the  one  thing  that  can  make  this  authority 
not  only  enduring,  but  salutary  and  life-giving,  will  be 
that  it  is  bestowed  by  the  communal  will,  to  the  en^ 
of  the  common  welfare.  In  how  many  ways  has  human- 
ity sought  to  achieve  this  welfare  !  It  has  tried  despot- 
isms ;  they  ended  in  disaster :  it  has  tried  anarchies ; 
they  have  left  us  in  our  chains.  What  if  the  times 
were  ripe  to  try  a  new  way,  —  the  way  of  illumined 
and  reasonable  sacrifice  of  individual  rights  to  a  wider 
good  ?  Neither  the  Russian  autocracy  nor  the  riot  of 
individualistic  laissez-faire  has  conquered  conditions 
under  which  the  majority  has  been  able  to  attain  the 
full  stature  of  manhood.  But  now  democracy,  inevit- 
able product  of  economic  change,  is  coming  to  its  own 
at  last.  Does  it  not  whisper  the  new  possibility, — 
a  social  order  in  which  equality  of  opportunity  shall 
not  only  be  educed  by  natural  necessity,  but  be  main- 
tained by  the  deliberate  choice  of  people  brought  up 
under  a  discipline  in  moderation  and  selflessness  com- 
petent to  prohibit  personal  powers  from  impeding  the 
full  welfare  of  one's  fellows  ?  The  voluntary  surren- 
ders involved  would  be  incumbent  on  all  alike,  on  the 
manual  worker  as  much  as  on  the  artist  or  the  ruler 
of  men. 

Surely  socialism  so  conceived  might  be  our  moral 
salvation.  It  might  afford  the  God-appointed  means 

199 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

to  check  the  self-indulgence  that  enervates  the  mod- 
ern world  and  the  egotism  that  blasts  us  like  disease. 
Neither  reform  in  education  nor  moralizing  at  large 
is  likely  to  afford  the  needed  corrective.  But  a  reor- 
ganization of  the  whole  basis  of  society  can  do  it.  To 
say  that  it  is  impossible  for  the  race  at  large  to  gain 
sufficient  self-control  to  adopt  an  order  planned  for 
attaining  the  most  general  diffusion  of  well-being  and 
opportunity  at  the  expense  of  "  those  spendthrift  liber- 
ties that  waste  liberty  "  is  to  despair  of  human  nature. 
Let  the  Potter's  Wheel,  as  the  ages  pass,  twirl  faster ; 
let  it  mould  the  clay  into  forms  increasingly  complex, 
by  pressure  increasingly  heavy,  involved,  and  severe. 
If  the  vessel  emerge  in  greater  and  more  serviceable 
beauty,  the  gain  is  clear ;  and  the  clay  will  sing  to  the 
pressure  of  the  wheel. 

IV 

We  cannot  expect,  of  course,  that  the  will  which 
creates  the  socialist  order  should  be  universal.  It  may 
suffice  if  it  be  as  common  as  the  will  that  to-day  keeps 
honesty  and  decency  as  the  general  and  outward  rule 
in  social  life.  One  sees  immediately  that  there  will 
always  be  some  types  of  people  miserable  in  the  so- 
cialist state.  Chief  among  them  are  a  number  of  those 
who  are  to-day  agitating  most  loudly  for  socialism. 
Your  born  malcontent  will  be  extremely  ill  at  ease  in 
the  social  order  for  which  he  clamors,  and  it  is  amus- 
ing to  contemplate  him  there!  One  foresees  him 
kicking  angrily  against  the  pricks,  and  organizing 

200 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


reactionary  movements  in  the  sacred  name  of  personal 
independence.  The  windy  demagogue,  the  man  of 
words,  the  restless  rebel,  —  it  is  by  a  curious  history 
that  he  is  in  the  socialist  ranks  at  all.  For  socialism, 
as  we  all  begin  to  see,  really  means  an  unparalleled 
degree  of  law  and  order.  Those  who  promote  it  are, 
though  against  their  wills,  the  friends  of  law;  and 
Mr.  Chesterton's  "  Man  who  was  Thursday"  is  en- 
tirely correct  in  suggesting  that  the  Central  Council 
of  Rebels  is  in  reality  composed  of  members  of  the 
secret  police. 

Self-assertion  and  self-effacement,  individualism 
and  chivalry  have  been,  as  we  know,  the  two  impel- 
ling forces  in  the  modern  revolt  against  civilization. 
Despite  the  Marxian  with  his  scorn  for  the  second, 
and  the  Churchman  with  his  distrust  of  the  first,  both 
are  potent,  positive,  and  essential.  From  Leopardi  to 
Heine,  to  Tolstoy,  to  Ibsen,  to  Nietzsche  ;  from  Maz- 
zini  to  Ruskin,  to  Morris,  to  Jaures,  —  the  two  forces 
pull  side  by  side,  yoke-fellows  looking  askance  each 
on  each,  but  ploughing  the  furrow  together.  Philan- 
thropists and  revolutionists,  idealists  and  material- 
ists, socialists  and  anarchists,  confusedly  work  together 
toward  an  unseen  end.  To  trace  the  action  and  re- 
action of  the  two  forces  is  a  study  in  distinctions 
awaiting  the  social  psychologist  aforesaid.  They  are 
still  united  for  attack.  When  this  work  is  done,  and 
the  "  forts  of  folly  fall,"  the  testing  of  the  ranks  will 
be  swift  and  sure.  Then  it  will  be  seen  who  is  the  true 
socialist,  for  we  shall  learn  which  man  is  really  at  home 

201 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

in  the  world  he  has  evoked.  Who  can  doubt  that  it  will 
be  he  who  has  trained  himself  spiritually  for  the  new 
order — who  by  watchful  self-control  has  developed  the 
new  social  intuitions,  the  swift  perception  of  that  deli- 
cate point  where  the  pressure  of  his  own  claims  and  pow- 
ers might  inflict  injury  rather  than  help  on  others?  This 
is  the  man  who  will  make  the  inner  strength  of  the  new 
state ;  and  it  is  he  who  will  rejoice  in  it,  not  the  impatient 
man  intent  on  self -development  who  is  the  chosen  hero 
of  certain  schools  in  letters  and  philosophy.  We  shall 
know  then  that  the  real  socialist  is  he  who  has  been 
actuated  all  along,  not  by  egotism  or  the  instinct  of 
revolt,  but  by  the  resolute  longing  for  a  state  in  which 
each  individual  shall  be  competent  to  attain  the  high- 
est point  of  development  consistent  with  the  general 
welfare.  The  barren  self-assertion,  the  helpless  and 
violent  temper  of  rebellion,  the  outcry  against  all  that 
checks  private  self-gratification,  which  for  over  a  hun- 
dred years  have  been  mistaking  themselves  for  a  passion 
for  freedom,  will  find  their  logical  executioner  where 
they  think  to  find  their  patron.  Byronism  and  Nietz- 
scheism  will  languish  miserably  —  or  else,  and  quite 
conceivably,  will  form  in  the  new  socialism  a  danger- 
ous element  that  will  be  allowed  just  enough  freedom 
to  act  as  safety-valve. 

But  there  are  others  besides  the  malcontents  who 
are  likely  to  feel  painfully  the  gentle  discipline  of  the 
socialist  state.  At  a  word,  the  pressure  will  probably 
be  most  severe  on  originality  and  self-indulgence :  on 
the  brilliant  and  the  weak.  Consider  for  a  moment 

202 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


the  probable  fate  of  genius  under  socialism.  Genius ! 
that  erratic  gift  so  notoriously  reluctant  to  submit 
itself  to  any  disciplines  whatever,  so  confident  that 
the  needs  of  its  own  soul  —  sometimes,  alas,  con- 
founded with  its  senses  —  are  the  one  light  by  which 
it  must  walk  I  Well,  one  does  foresee  a  hard  time  for 
the  artists,  —  in  particular  for  the  minor  men,  artists 
by  temperament  rather  than  by  power.  Many  a  man 
convinced  that  he  is  born  to  be  a  poet  may  die  with 
all  his  music  in  him,  having  served  the  community  in 
bitterness  of  soul  as  cook  and  bottle-washer  to  the  end. 
As  one  contemplates  this  elimination  of  minor  poets, 
one  congratulates  the  community  while  commiserating 
the  singers.  But  what  about  the  really  great  men  ? 
There  will  be  pensions,  of  course,  and  exemptions. 
The  new  order  will  be  very  eager  to  discover  genius  : 
as  soon  as  a  man  has  justified  himself  in  its  eyes  it 
will  free  him  from  other  pursuits,  bidding  him  paint 
and  write  for  the  rejoicing  world.  But  will  the  world 
make  its  selection  wisely  ?  Ah,  there 's  the  rub.  It 
never  did  yet.  One  pictures  Martin  Tupper  content- 
edly pouring  forth  platitudes  on  a  pension,  while 
John  Milton  writes  the  "Paradise  Lost"  of  the  future 
in  odd  moments,  when  his  quota  of  work  is  done. 

Perhaps  the  epic  will  be  none  the  worse  for  it. 
Eating  one's  bread  with  tears,  and  learning  in  suffering 
to  teach  in  song,  may  help  in  the  future  as  in  the  past 
to  deepen  the  music.  Injustice  and  neglect  have  been 
foster-parents  of  the  muse.  But  of  course  one  does 
believe  that  a  mighty  saving  of  creative  power  will  be 

203 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

effected  by  the  new  order.  A  Thomas  Chatterton  will 
not  commit  suicide  when  that  good  day  has  dawned. 

For  we  have  to  remember  the  immense  amount  of 
social  waste  involved  in  the  present  system.  Imagining 
a  time  in  which  the  majority  of  children  will  not  be 
assigned  before  birth  to  an  industrial  slavery  in  which 
all  artistic  instincts  are  stifled,  we  see  the  unpredict- 
able gain  that  may  result.  When  we  contemplate  the 
life  of  the  average  man  to-day,  we  are  to  think,  not 
of  the  university  student  or  the  successful  merchant, 
but  of  the  factory  hand,  or  the  clerk.  Our  despotisms 
and  our  anarchies  have  alike  failed  miserably  to  give 
this  man  a  chance.  After  a  century  and  a  quarter  of 
the  industrial  individualism  plus  political  equality  in- 
augurated with  such  glowing  hopes,  we  face,  broadly 
speaking,  a  world  in  bondage.  And  if  social  reorgan- 
ization on  broad  lines  is  called  for  more  and  more 
loudly,  even  at  the  evident  cost  of  some  surrender  of 
private  independence,  it  is  from  the  growing  convic- 
tion that  such  surrender  is  the  price  to  be  paid  for  a 
rich  and  full  life  for  the  majority. 

V 

Our  new  hope  of  social  welfare  was  not  possible  be- 
fore the  advent  of  democracy ;  nor  was  it  possible  until 
democracy  had  had  time  to  work  for  several  generations 
as  a  leaven  within  the  souls  of  men.  For  the  self-con- 
trol and  sacrifice  for  which  it  calls,  on  the  part  of  the 
strong,  can  find  motive  only  in  that  loyalty  to  the 
whole  which  democracy  brings,  and  which  we  feel 

204 


FREE  BECAUSE  IMBOUND 


to-day  tingling  in  every  nerve  of  the  social  body. 
Freedom !  It  is  indeed  a  holy  name,  in  which  more 
crimes  are  committed  than  those  known  to  Madame 
Roland.  Only  to-day  are  we  beginning  to  realize  that 
it  is  a  term  of  social  rather  than  of  individual  import, 
never  to  be  realized  by  the  one  while  the  many  are 
still  bound.  True  liberty  is  positive,  not  negative, 
dealing  less  with  the  removal  of  restriction  than  with 
the  imparting  of  power.  It  consists,  not  in  the  license 
of  each  person  to  indulge  desire,  but  in  the  power 
bestowed  by  the  community  upon  its  every  member 
to  rise  to  the  level  of  his  richest  capacity  by  living 
in  harmony  with  the  whole.  Of  this  freedom,  Dante 
knew  more  than  the  schools  of  the  Revolution ;  for  he 
placed  it  at  the  end,  not  the  beginning  of  humanity's 
journey,  and  showed  it  to  be  a  gift  awaiting  the  climber 
at  the  summit  of  the  mount  of  discipline  rather  than 
a  companion  of  the  pilgrim  way. 

Social  welfare  is  a  wider  term  than  personal  liberty, 
but  it  develops  to  include  that  liberty.  The  joyous 
surrender  of  personal  rights  which  the  socialist  state, 
in  accordance  with  the  common  will,  must  demand 
from  its  citizens  will  be  in  itself  the  evidence  of  a  high 
degree  of  private  freedom.  For  the  crowning  glory  and 
the  only  thorough  proof  of  freedom  has  always  been 
a  willing  submission  ;  and  the  capacity  for  living  in 
harmony  with  the  whole  may  again  and  again  prove 
a  kenosis  or  self -empty  ing.  "  I  will  run  the  way  of 
Thy  commandments  when  Thou  hast  set  my  heart  at 
liberty,"  said  the  psalmist.  The  fruit  of  inner  liberty 

205 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

is  ever  obedience  to  law.  Only  he  possesses  who  re- 
frains, and  the  way  of  renunciation  is  always  the  way 
of  freedom. 

When  this  lesson  shall  have  been  learned  we  shall 
have  compassed  that  " solidarity  in  freedom"  which 
Lassalle  foretold,  and  know  ourselves  in  the  new  and 
deepest  sense  "  free  because  imbound."  And  the  change 
in  emphasis  from  self-assertion  to  self-restraint  will 
imply  a  scale  of  honor  among  the  virtues  widely  dif- 
ferent from  what  obtains  to-day. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   ETHICS   OF  INEQUALITY 


IN  seeing  that  the  "  Coming  Slavery  "  of  the  socialist 
state  may  become  the  "  service  that  is  perfect  freedom," 
we  have  dissipated  one  of  the  strongest  elements  in 
the  religious  distrust  of  socialism.  But  our  pilgrim, 
pausing  between  two  ideals,  can  hardly  be  ready  to 
accept  the  new  faith  yet.  For  he  cannot  forget  the 
lovely  light  in  which  the  Apologia  of  Eeligion  placed 
the  moral  achievements  of  the  old  order,  —  too  fine 
to  abandon  without  regret  even  on  lower  levels,  and 
offering  a  counsel  of  perfection  full  of  rare  spiritual 
beauty.  The  unexplored  country  ahead  is  more  allur- 
ing than  we  had  anticipated ;  yet  from  the  dear  land 
in  which  we  are  abiding,  how  well  we  have  discerned 
the  stars !  We  will  not  move  on  while  our  hearts  would 
still  be  drawn  to  wistful  retrospect ;  rather  let  us  look 
around  us  once  more,  and  scrutinize  the  moral  assets 
of  our  present-day  civilization  more  closely,  on  the 
lower  levels  first  and  then  on  the  higher. 

The  primary  fact  about  our  civilization  is  that  it 
is  founded,  like  all  others  from  time  immemorial, 
on  social  and  industrial  inequality.  This  broad  point 
of  agreement  between  capitalism  and  former  society, 
notably  in  the  Middle  Ages,  is  our  reason  for  not  re- 

207 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

jecting  at  once  that  Apologia  of  Religion  which  points 
us  to  the  spiritual  victories  of  the  past  as  a  reason  for 
refusing  to  change  the  basis  of  the  social  structure  in 
the  future.  It  is  of  course  the  socialist  aim  to  diminish 
such  inequalities,  and  what  we  have  to  do  is  to  inquire 
whether  such  a  change  would  help  or  hinder  spiritual 
life :  we  must  compare  the  ethics  actually  attendant 
on  social  inequality  with  those  which  equality  is  likely 
to  engender. 

Just  because  our  present  ethics  are  rooted  in  eco- 
nomic inequality,  the  first  phase  of  our  inquiry  is  com- 
plex ;  for  social  grades  have  their  moral  counterparts. 
There  is  one  glory  of  the  sun  and  another  glory  of  the 
moon,  and  there  is  one  virtue  of  the  superior  and  an- 
other of  the  dependent.  We  must  examine  both  types, 
on  the  ordinary  levels,  —  the  ethics  of  privilege,  and 
the  ethics  of  want.  When  we  come  to  the  heights, 
however,  our  task  will  be  simplified  ;  for  in  that  purer 
air,  virtue  creates,  as  it  were,  its  own  aristocracy,  and 
escapes  any  evident  relation  to  the  "  determining  eco- 
nomic base." 

II 

First,  then,  the  ethics  of  privilege,  the  best  quali- 
ties of  those  who  Have :  and  we  see  at  once  that  at 
their  choicest  they  are  the  direct  result  of  those  social 
inequalities  we  deplore.  It  may  be  true,  as  the  last 
chapter  claimed,  that  only  the  coarser  virtues  flourish 
under  our  competitive  regime,  and  that  the  finer  — 
such  as  humility,  non-resistance,  and  charity  —  are 

208 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

tolerated  only  as  exceptions.  None  the  less,  religion  is 
likely  to  rest  its  case  on  the  latter  rather  than  on  the 
former,  —  and  logically,  for  they  spring  apparently 
from  the  very  environment  that  condemns  them. 
Blake  puts  the  case  with  his  usual  cogency  :  — 

Mercy  would  be  no  more 
If  there  were  nobody  poor, 
And  pity  no  more  would  be 
If  all  were  as  happy  as  we  : 
And  mutual  fear  brings  peace  : 
Misery's  increase 
Are  mercy,  pity,  peace. 

These  virtues,  born  of  social  superiority,  carry  with 
them  a  whole  code  of  chivalry,  sanctified  by  the  ten- 
derest  and  most  lofty  instincts  of  the  past,  and  it  cer- 
tainly looks  as  if  social  equality  would  cripple  or  de- 
stroy them. 

But  if  we  clear  our  minds  of  cant,  we  note  a  curious 
thing.  The  more  the  virtues  of  chivalry,  as  we  may  call 
them,  develop,  the  worse  they  fare.  Never  were  "  mercy, 
pity,  peace"  more  in  evidence  than  now,  —  and  in  de- 
fiance of  Nietzsche,  most  of  us  are  glad  of  it.  "  The 
cruelest  man  living  could  not  sit  at  his  feast  unless  he 
sat  blindfolded,"  cried  Ruskin,  —  and  helped  the  nine- 
teenth century  to  its  great  work,  of  tearing  off  the  band- 
age which  we  can  never  put  on  again.  But  just  in 
proportion  as  our  pity  becomes  enlightened,  the  situ- 
ation becomes  grim.  Generous  impulse,  because  it 
seeks  efficiency,  calls  calculation  and  investigation  to 
its  aid.  And  they  suffocate  it. 

209 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

Personal  joy  in  giving  is  fast  disappearing.  Once 
it  was  fun  to  surprise  with  a  shilling  the  beggar  who 
asked  for  a  penny,  —  but  we  can  never  know  that  joy 
again  without  a  sense  of  guilt.  We  are  even  advised 
to  refrain  from  giving  the  penny,  lest  pauperism  be 
increased.  Examples  less  obvious  crowd  the  mind.  How 
natural  to  feed  hungry  school-children  ;  but  wait ! 
Shall  we  run  the  risk  of  making  a  shiftless  father  still 
more  irresponsible  ?  Worse  yet,  if  the  need  be  effectively 
met,  of  lowering  wages  ?  So  problem  replaces  impulse  : 
the  administration  of  relief  becomes  an  intellectual 
exercise  rather  than  a  moral  adventure,  and  amateurs 
in  despair  find  it  so  hard  to  help  their  fellow  men 
without  hurting  them  that  if  they  are  wise  they  dele- 
gate the  task  of  dispensing  their  benefits  to  a  brisk 
army  of  salaried  officials,  habitually  underpaid,  "ex- 
perts" in  their  several  lines,  who,  according  to  temper- 
ament and  function,  develop  in  curious  mixture  the 
qualities  of  the  saint  and  the  detective. 

"  Charitable  Work !  "  What  does  the  phrase  sug- 
gest? Free  and  tender  devotion,  such  as  so  joyously 
ministered  to  the  poor  in  the  Middle  Ages?  Yes, 
thank  God,  sometimes ;  but  surely  it  also  suggests 
long  weary  hours  spent  in  committee  meetings,  and 
the  ungrateful,  endless  task  of  "  investigation."  Love 
and  pity  are  stronger  than  in  past  ages,  but  their  be- 
wildered feet  are  habitually  entangled  in  mazes  of  red 
tape.  Like  Wordsworth's  cloud  we  must  "  move  alto- 
gether if  we  move  at  all,"  and  our  benevolences  must 
be  "  associated  "  like  the  rest  of  our  energies. 

210 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

Organized  Charity,  scrimped  and  iced, 

lu  the  Name  of  a  cautious,  statistical  Christ, 


is  the  order  of  the  day. 

We  shall  waste  our  time  if  we  grumble.  The  old 
casual,  uncritical  generosity  was  not  only  demoral- 
izing but  inadequate.  Its  day  is  past,  with  that 
of  machicolated  battlements  and  Byzantine  mosaics. 
Sporadic  revivals  are  to  be  found,  —  even  we  in  our 
weakness  may  be  subject  to  them,  —  yet  if  we  are  self- 
indulgent  we  despise  ourselves  for  emotional  dilet- 
tantes. Even  the  Salvation  Army  sends  out  more 
tentacles  of  a  "  scientific  "  nature  than  it  cares  to  ac- 
knowledge. We  must  all  accept  and  approve  the  new 
methods  brought  about  by  our  clamor  for  efficiency ; 
yet  with  the  personal  note  vanishes  the  spiritual 
value,  — -  and  shyly,  apologetically  and  sadly  must  we 
present  the  activities  of  our  charity  agents  or  the 
faithful  labors  of  the  philanthropic  people  who  tread 
the  endless  round  of  committee  meetings,  as  moral  as- 
sets fair  enough  to  justify  the  atrocities  of  modern 
life. 

Indeed,  if  we  are  candid,  most  of  us  confess  that 
we  could  see  the  philanthropic  attitude  vanish  out  of 
the  world  without  regret.  As  correlative  to  feudalism, 
it  had  its  beauties :  as  correlative  to  democracy,  it  is 
out  of  place.  Moreover,  the  police  duty  to  which  it  is 
now  called  is  terribly  bad  for  its  morals.  It  is  an  odd 
psychological  fact  that  to  give  life  usually  makes  a 
man  better,  while  to  give  money  makes  him  worse. 
Modern  scientific  charity  is  not  always  good  for  the 

211 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

poor:  cringing  greed,  dishonesty,  shiftlessness,  are 
painful  realities,  though  they  may  loom  less  porten- 
tous in  the  eyes  of  the  Recording  Angel  than  in 
those  of  the  charity  agent  or  of  the  millionaire. 
But  these  products  fade  into  insignificance  as  com- 
pared with  the  influence  of  charity  upon  the  well-to-do. 
"  Judge  not "  runs  the  word  of  Wisdom  ;  but  a  philan- 
thropy that  does  not  judge  has  been  tried  and  found 
wanting,  and  the  professional  philanthropist  forced 
often  against  his  will  into  the  judgment  seat  is  a  de- 
pressing sight.  So  far  as  he  is  noble  of  heart,  there  is 
no  sadder  man  :  so  far  as  he  is  ignoble,  none  so  hard. 
Alas,  how  constantly  we  see  generosity  engendering 
suspicious  pessimism,  disillusion,  and  self-complacency ! 
At  best,  the  qualities  of  high  finance  are  strange  con- 
comitants of  mercy;  at  worst,  the  motives  of  our 
donors  are  in  danger  of  becoming  painfully  mixed. 
There  is  something  which  revolts  the  inmost  fibre  in 
the  spectacle  of  those  vast  benevolences  of  modern 
life  which  are  too  often  ostentatious  returns  from  se- 
cret cruelties.  As  for  the  numerous  ladies  who  sit  so 
vigorously  on  diverse  Boards  indefatigably  collecting 
and  disbursing  funds,  despite  their  praiseworthy  ac- 
tivities they  are  often  either  as  worried  or  as  unlovely 
types  as  civilization  produces.  The  attitude  of  organi- 
zations becomes  a  by-word  of  reproach  in  freer  forms 
of  social  effort,  while  the  unhappy  conscientiousness 
of  those  gentler  rich  who  cling  to  old-fashioned  ways, 
and  are  of  course  exploited  on  all  sides,  is  pitiable  to 
behold. 

212 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

It  is  a  queer  and  false  situation.  Sweet  Charity  is 
with  us  still, —  larger,  more  enterprising  than  ever. 
But  the  joy  has  died  out  of  her  eyes.  She  no  longer 
dances  rose  -  red  beside  the  Chariot  of  the  Church, 
attendant  on  Heavenly  Wisdom,  but  treads  gingerly, 
like  a  modern  lady  in  a  hobble  skirt,  nervous,  self- 
distrustful,  conscientious,  and  a  little  discouraged. 
When  she  relaxes  and  amuses  herself  for  a  moment, 
she  regains  a  trifle  of  her  old  charm ;  but  as  soon  as 
she  settles  to  serious  business,  and  leaves  the  do- 
mestic hearth  for  a  public  career,  there  is  no  more 
womanly  softness  about  her  than  about  a  militant  suf- 
fragette. 

What  we  say  of  Charity,  we  must  also  say  in  a 
measure  of  all  relations  on  the  side  of  superiors 
which  accompany  industrial  inequalities.  These  rela- 
tions are  still  full  of  delicate  beauty  when  exercised 
by  good  people.  But  two  insidious  enemies  are  under- 
mining them :  industrial  centralization,  and  demo- 
cracy. The  "  Grande  Industrie  "  places  the  employer 
at  an  indefinite  number  of  removes  from  his  work- 
men, and  the  personal  touch  between  them  must  dis- 
appear. Such  fellowship  as  we  see  in  Dekker's  jolly 
old  comedy,  "  The  Shoemaker's  Holiday,"  between 
the  kindly  head  of  the  shop  and  his  loyal  apprentices, 
seems  as  romantic  to  us  to  -  day  as  the  relation  of 
squire  to  knight  or  knight  to  lady.  Its  place  is  taken 
at  best  by  "  welfare  work,"  impersonally  planned,  ex- 
cellent in  its  way,  but  hardly  competent  to  purify  the  , 
soul.  For  it  is  decreed  that  the  best  moral  opportuni- 1 

213 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

ties  live  face  to  face  and  man  to  man,  not  corporation 
to  union  ;  still  less,  organized  capital  to  helpless  and 
unorganized  labor. 

All  the  time,  the  ferment  of  democracy  is  secretly  at 
work  vitiating  confidence  and  comfort.  The  situation 
tends  to  the  most  harmful  type  of  moral  confusion.  For 
the  employer  knows  that  the  utmost  reach  of  his  consid- 
eration will  never  satisfy  those  more  and  more  doggedly 
class-conscious  groups  which  will  not  pause  content  short 
of  social  equality  itself.  If  he  indorses  the  unions,  he 
encourages  the  force  that  is  trying,  consciously  or  not, 
to  drive  him  out  of  existence.  If  he  opposes  them  and 
endeavors  to  reconcile  his  men  by  ingenious  devices, 
bonuses,  garden  cities,  and  the  like,  he  cannot  blame 
them  if  they  suspect  his  motives  to  be  mixed.  Prob- 
ably honest  self-examination  will  show  him  that  they 
are.  The  chivalry  of  labor  and  the  responsibility  of  the 
employer  was  the  word  of  the  advanced  radical  when  it 
was  propounded  by  Carlyle  and  developed  by  Ruskin : 
to-day,  as  it  more  and  more  fascinates  employers,  it 
is  the  last  expedient  of  the  high-minded  conservative. 
The  time  is  rapidly  approaching  when  its  logic  and  sin- 
cerity will  be  swept  away  by  the  tide  of  democratic 
ambitions  and  organization. 

Such  are  some  of  the  pitfalls  encountered  by  the 
ethics  of  privilege  in  a  shifting  society  which  through 
all  irregularities  is  leaving  the  aristocratic  order  be- 
hind, and  advancing  toward  new  and  more  democratic 
society.  The  mediaeval  code  of  chivalry  based  on  the  re- 
sponsibility of  superiors  did  more  or  less  effectively  sus- 

214 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

tain  justice  in  its  day,  and  really  at  times  succored  the 
oppressed.  But  its  essentially  undemocratic  character 
is  evident  from  the  absence  of  the  common  people  and 
their  wrongs  from  the  ordinary  run  of  its  records. 
Our  modern  code  is  in  a  like  predicament.  Its  life 
depends  on  the  continuation  of  the  system  which  gave 
it  birth ;  and  as  that  system  changes,  we  can  watch  it 
under  our  eyes  losing  its  quality  as  an  instrument  of 
justice  and  mercy,  and  becoming,  even  when  most  hon- 
estly self -deceived,  tyrant  in  guise  of  champion,  and , 
enemy  of  the  progress  it  seeks  to  serve. 

Far  be  it  from  us  to  ignore  the  disinterested  values 
that  exist  both  in  our  charity  and  in  our  business. 
Adorning  the  names  of  our  noblest  citizens,  they  leap 
to  the  protesting  mind.  There  are  direct  and  demo- 
cratic types  of  social  ministration  open  to  none  of 
our  strictures.  There  are  experiments,  constantly 
more  frequent,  in  business  ethics,  which  testify  to 
the  eager  and  thorough  desire  of  our  most  distin- 
guished leaders  of  privilege  to  attain  industrial  jus- 
tice. Intelligence  as  well  as  feeling  is  at  the  inspiring 
work.  But  these  more  uncompromising  and  single- 
hearted  attempts  at  readjustment  are  curiously  sug- 
gestive, for  with  one  accord,  whether  in  philanthropy, 
business,  or  reform,  they  tend  beyond  themselves,  and 
point  to  that  debatable  land,  whence  the  heights  of 
socialism  are  visible.  The  broader  our  vision,  the  more 
clearly  we  see  that  the  ethics  of  inequality,  so  far  as 
privilege  is  concerned,  are  wearing  very  thin.  When 
genuine,  they  lead  to  their  own  undoing.  When  col- 

215 


0 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

ored  by  self-deception  or  worse,  they  hinder  the  accept- 
ance of  the  new  garments  desperately  needed,  by  con- 
cealing the  hopeless  rottenness  of  the  old  fabric  with 
the  attractiveness  of  its  design. 

Ill 

So  much  for  wealth,  —  and  now  for  want.  Let  us 
look  at  the  back  side  of  the  weave,  —  the  morals  of 
modern  poverty. 

At  once  we  encounter  an  odd  but  sincere  difficulty, 
proffered  by  certain  good  people  :  Poverty  is  a  state, 
not  only  sought  by  such  as  Tolstoy  and  Francis,  but 
commended  by  Christ  himself.  Socialism  would  hound 
poverty  out  of  the  world.  Does  it  do  well  ? 

Let  us  hasten  to  agree  that  the  poor  are  in  a  much 
safer  moral  condition  to-day  than  the  rich.  Their  ob- 
vious defects,  such  as  dirt,  irresponsibility,  thrift- 
lessness,  extravagance,  irrilate  their  well-groomed  crit- 
ics ;  but  it  is  a  disconcerting  fact  that  these  defects 
have  never  vexed  the  great  moralists  half  so  much  as 
have  the  prim  virtues  of  the  worshipers  at  the  shrine 
of  Stevenson's  "  bestial  goddesses,  Comfort  and  Re- 
spectability." Indeed,  none  of  them  are  incompatible 
with  the  traits  of  the  True  Citizen,  as  enumerated  by 
Jesus,  —  poverty  of  spirit,  meekness,  purity  of  heart, 
aspiration  toward  justice,  and  the  rest.  Poverty,  even 
at  its  most  perverted,  carries  with  it  to  some  slight 
degree  that  deliverance  from  worldly  temptation  which 
has  caused  it  to  be  counseled  the  world  over  by  de- 
votees of  the  Eternal.  He  would  be  a  bold  man  who 

216 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

should  deny  to  the  dwellers  in  tenements  and  sweat- 
shops the  promise  that  so  tenderly  concludes  both  the 
first  Beatitude  and  the  last :  and  the  more  intimately 
he  knows  their  patient,  daily  life,  the  more  reverently 
he  will  perceive  them  to  deserve  it. 

Yet  that  the  conditions  of  our  proletariat  as  a 
whole  are  spiritually  desirable  can  be  maintained  only 
at  a  distance  from  them  and  from  reality-.  And  when 
one  finds  persons  who  live  softly  adducing  the  words 
of  Jesus  as  a  reason  for  leaving  these  conditions  un- 
touched, one  recoils  with  a  shudder.  Before  we  pro- 
ceed to  discussion  with  these  sentimentalists,  let  us  see 
them  embrace  the  opportunity  they  commend,  unclass 
themselves,  and  live  in  an  unclean  tenement  on  a 
starvation  wage.  Till  then  the  dispassionate  dare  to 
assert  that  the  moral  effects  of  extreme  poverty, 
while  less  dangerous  than  those  of  extreme  wealth, 
are  none  the  less  evil.  In  the  one  case  life  perishes  of 
satiety,  in  the  other  of  inanition.  Thank  God,  it  is 
the  unconquerable  glory  of  the  scheme  of  things  that 
an  amazing  secret  force  is  in  the  world,  competent  to 
educe  permanent  spiritual  good  from  all  transitory 
material  evil.  The  opportunity  is  open  to  valiant 
souls,  in  every  industrial  situation  as  in  every  private 
crisis,  to  turn  cruel  restriction  and  poignant  agony  to 
highest  gain.  But  this  blessed  fact  does  not  exonerate 
us  from  trying  to  conquer  evil.  The  endurance  of 
cancer  may  turn  a  frivolous  woman  into  a  saint,  — 
yet  the  community  would  not  regret  the  discovery  of 
a  cancer-cure. 

217 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

Valiant  souls  in  plenty  are  to  be  found  under  the 
yoke  of  modern  poverty.  Yet  that  yoke  is  not  easy 
and  the  burden  imposed  is  not  light.  Lady  Poverty 
walks  to-day  in  chains.  Once,  hosts  of  exultant  lovers 
followed  her,  singing  the  song  of  the  Free,  to  that  high 
Paradise  of  which  they  hailed  her  citizen  and  queen. 
To-day,  myriad  reluctant  victims  are  dragged  along 
the  weary  flats  oOfe,  entangled  in  her  bonds :  — 


itsoOi 
^ler 


her  on  the  Umbrian  Hills, 
hair  unbound,  her  feet  unshod; 
As  one  whom  secret  glory  fills 

She  walked — alone  with  God. 
I  met  her  in  the  city  street: 

Oh,  changed  was  her  aspect  then ! 
With  heavy  eyes  and  weary  feet 
She  walked  alone  —  with  men. 

Let  us  not  be  deceived  by  a  word.  Poverty  in  itself 
is  neither  good  nor  bad.  Its  moral  power  is  measured 
by  the  psychical  conditions  it  connotes,  and  these  dif- 
fer widely.  Looking  behind  word  to  fact,  no  condition 
could  possibly  be  more  inimical  at  all  significant  points 
to  the  ideal  of  the  Beatitudes  than  that  of  the  modern 
wage-earner.  That  considered  the  lilies,  and  took  no 
thought  for  the  morrow,  ours,  by  duty  and  neces- 
sity, is  harassed  by  ceaseless  care.  That  was  comrade 
of  love,  ours  is  companion  of  suspicion.  The  poverty 
of  the  Franciscans  went  on  its  way  singing,  "  Receive 
my  all ! "  Modern  poverty  clamors  forever,  "  Give  me 
more !  "  and,  far  from  abandoning  its  claims  on  the 
universe,  with  those  meek  who  are  to  inherit  the  earth, 
struggles  doggedly  and  constantly  to  wrest  from  an  unwil- 

218 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

ling  world  the  minimum  necessary  to  animal  existence. 
Poverty,  as  seen  in  the  New  Testament  and  in  certain 
mediaeval  records,  conveys  an  extraordinary  impres- 
sion of  buoyant  vitality  and  inward  peace ;  apathetic 
languor  and  harassed  restlessness  are  habitual  products 
of  the  modern  type,  for  the  wage-worker  to-day  is  caught 
in  the  toils  of  a  system  which  crushes  him  into  list- 
lessness  when  it  does  not  sting  him  into  rage. 

At  a  word,  the  poverty  comme™fc  not  only  by 
Jesus,  but  in  precept  and  example  by  sH^reat  religious 
teachers  alike  of  the  East  and  West,  is  a  stat*  of  free- 
dom from  worldly  interests ;  the  poverty  ftwli  rests 
an  incubus  on  modern  society  ever  sine? the  In- 
dustrial Revolution  is  a  state  of  helpless  bondage  to 
these  interests.  We  may  wistfully  suspect  that  the  old 
ideal  should  not  be  allowed  to  fade  or  perish :  of  that, 
hereafter.  But  let  us  not  make  the  mistake  of  looking 
for  it  in  the  modern  slum,  for  there  it  does  not  exist. 
Over  those  regions  presides  a  wizened  spectre,  hideous 
caricature  of  the  Bride  whose  stern  beauty  was  so  life- 
communicating  ;  and  that  true  Lady  wanders  in  exile, 
far  from  these  our  wars.  No  honest  person,  looking 
at  the  average  public-school  child  from  a  tenement 
district,  or  anaemic  working-girl  from  candy  or  biscuit 
factory,  can  complacently  hint  that  to  destroy  such 
poverty  as  theirs  is  to  imperil  the  ideal  of  Jesus. 

Love  and  detachment  from  the  world  are  the  cen- 
tral points  of  that  ideal.  They  are  the  two  forces  to 
which  Religion  looks  to  transform  the  social  order,  and 
which  she  opposes  to  the  socialist  plan  of  equity  founded 

219 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

in  necessary  law.  She  praises  them  with  so  high  elo- 
quence that  our  pilgrim  bent  on  eternal  values  is  not 
yet  able  to  follow  the  lure  of  the  socialist  song.  Yet 
as  he  studies  the  play  of  these  forces  in  that  actual 
order  which  religion  is  so  loath  to  abandon,  he  has 
met  successive  disappointments.  For  the  largesse  of 
love,  we  naturally  look  first  to  the  privileged  classes, 
who  have  the  most  to  sacrifice:  for  indifference  to 
worldly  cares,  we  look  to  those  driven  by  earthly  want 
to  seek  for  heavenly  gain.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  how- 
ever, we  have  found  that  love  among  the  privileged 
classes  has  set  up  a  business  office,  and  works  largely 
through  salaried  agents,  —  while  unworldliness  is  a 
forbidden  luxury  to  the  self-respecting  poor. 

Perhaps  the  trouble  is  simply  with  our  half-heart- 
edness.  Now  let  Religion  stand  on  guard  for  we  ap- 
proach the  sanctuary  of  her  Apologia !  We  abandon 
for  the  moment  the  democratic  attitude  in  spirituali- 
ties for  that  aristocratic  attitude  which  has  always 
been  more  or  less  native  to  her :  we  turn  from  the 
common  lot,  to  consider  the  Counsels  of  Perfection. 
By  watching  them  at  work,  we  shall  discover  whether 
in  a  civilization  based  on  social  inequality  the  ethics 
Religion  preaches  can  ever  be  an  effective  redeeming 
force.  To  put  the  matter  boldly :  does  history  give  us 
any  ground  to  hope  that  so  long  as  we  leave  our  pres- 
ent social  organization  intact,  a  more  perfect  obedi- 
ence to  the  ideals  of  Jesus  would  achieve  our  social 
salvation  ? 


220 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

IV 

We  interrogate  history  because  ours  is  an  unheroic 
age.  The  religious  apologia  has  a  right  to  its  fullest 
advantage  ;  it  may  show  us  what  it  can  in  those  ages 
of  faith  when,  as  it  loves  to  tell  us,  its  sway  was  more 
complete  than  now.  And  as  we  turn  to  watch  the  fate 
of  the  attempts  literally  to  follow  to  the  uttermost 
the  social  teachings  of  Jesus,  Franciscanism  once  more 
invites  us  ;  not  only  because  it  is  the  fairest  flower  of 
social  Christianity,  but  because  it  expresses  with  sin- 
gular completeness  the  impulse  operative  in  every 
purely  religious  quest  for  social  redemption  down  to 
our  own  day. 

For  the  peculiar  attraction  Francis  exerts  over  us 
is  due  to  the  comparative  modernity  of  his  message. 
In  one  most,  important  respect,  as  we  have  already 
hinted,  he  broke  completely  with  the  monastic  ideal 
behind  him.  That  ideal  had  expressed  itself  in  isola- 
tion ;  Francis  insisted  on  expressing  his  in  fellowship. 
When  his  followers  took  Lady  Poverty  to  the  top 
of  a  high  hill  and  gleefully  bade  her  behold  as  their 
cloister  all  Italy  outspread  below,  they  voiced  what  was 
at  once  the  fulfillment  and  the  abrogation  of  the 
vast  secret  travail  in  spirit  which  had  realized  itself 
in  the  monastic  orders.  These  orders  had  bidden  men 
save  their  souls  by  fleeing  from  an  evil  world.  Francis 
pushed  his  demands  further  than  they  had  done,  for 
he  required  absolute  renunciation  not  only  of  personal 
but  of  corporate  possessions,  and  claimed  absolutely 

221 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  whole  life  without  reserves  for  love  and  service. 
Yet  he  sent  men  back  into  the  world  again.  They 
were  to  reconcile  sacrifice  to  the  uttermost  with 
a  free  and  natural  existence  in  the  open :  to  outlaw 
calculation  from  their  audacious  code,  welcome  with 
magnanimous  joy  alms,  be  they  of  crusts  or  mountains, 
and  render  services  unmeasured,  unstinted,  in  the 
free  largesse  of  reckless  affection.  Thus  in  fellowship 
and  liberty  they  were  to  realize  that  entire  heedless- 
ness  toward  personal  need  and  the  decencies  of  self- 
protection,  which  had  never  before  been  deemed  pos- 
sible except  through  aloofness  to  natural  ties  and 
subjection  to  personal  bondage. 

And  we,  to  whom  the  natural  order  is  sacred,  to 
whom  as  to  Francis  the  call  of  Love  comes  first  from 
the  suffering  faces  of  our  brothers,  and  who  crave  with 
him  a  cloister  that  shall  embrace  the  world,  — we  for 
whom  love  must  be  fulfilled  in  freedom  hail  in  the 
more  human  ideal  of  the  Franciscans  a  social  adven- 
ture which  we  can  understand.  The  great  monastic 
compromise  had  the  advantage  of  being  entirely  prac- 
ticable, as  its  extent  and  persistence  show  ;  for  still 
to-day  its  echoes  haunt  our  dreams.  But  it  had  little 
organic  connection  either  with  the  intention  of  Christ 
or  with  our  own  quest  for  social  justice,  for  it  de- 
spaired of  the  world  and  deserted  it.  The  adventures 
which  interest  us  more  deeply  to-day  are  those  which 
refuse  to  meet  the  situation  by  running  away,  and 
among  those  Franciscanism  is  the  greatest  though  not 
the  first. 

222 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

That  Franciscanism  was  a  natural  product  of  the 
times  is  proved  by  the  amazing  record  of  those  early 
years.  Not  by  hundreds,  but  by  thousands,  men 
from  every  civilized  country  ran  to  embrace  Madonna 
Poverty,  sang  her  praises  to  a  new  music  full  of  magic 
sweetness,  abandoned  all  claims  to  the  universe  as  they 
gave  it  no  promises,  and  throwing  aside  prudent  bal- 
ances of  give  and  take,  entered  into  the  heritage  of  the 
meek,  the  Treasure  of  the  Humble. 

Even  in  our  degenerate  days,  faint  pleasant  traces 
of  the  ideal  linger  in  the  Franciscan  Order.  At  the 
holy  Mount  of  La  Verna,  where  the  forests  and  hill 
pastures  still  seem  refreshed  by  the  wings  of  remem- 
bering angels,  the  old  spirit  survives.  Unlimited  hos- 
pitality is  merrily  offered.  Throngs  of  bright-kerchiefed 
peasants  wend  their  way  on  Sundays  to  feast  on  the 
abundant  bounties  prepared  free  by  the  sweating 
Brothers,  —  and  the  cold  tourist  feels  sadly  convicted 
of  ill-breeding  if  he  inquires  the  price  of  his  enter- 
tainment. The  Brothers  are  quite  aware  that  they 
have  technically  no  property.  Ask  to  whom  the 
pretty  white  shepherd  dog  belongs,  and  you  will  be 
told  with  a  twinkle  :  "  Not  to  us  poor  brothers  minor. 
But  he  is  a  pleasant  dog,  and  friendly ;  it  is  here  that 
he  comes  for  his  alms."  Who  would  stay  at  an  inn, 
where  matter-of-fact  bargaining  obtains,  when  this 
lavish  loving-kindness  is  waiting?  And  if  on  depar- 
ture he  expresses  gratitude  by  an  offering  which  shall 
help  to  feed  the  next  penniless  guest,  he  still  knows 
that  he  has  been  breathing  a  better  air  than  that  of 

223 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHAEACTER 

the  valley,  where  chaffer  and  bargain  hold  their  cus- 
tomary way. 

Even  at  La  Verna,  conventions  are  to-day  not 
absent.  But  in  thirteenth-century  Italy,  with  feudal- 
ism as  a  background  and  a  simple  agricultural  life  in 
the  foreground,  the  Franciscan  life  was  for  a  time  an 
absolute  and  uncompromising  reality.  That  time,  how- 
ever, was  brief.  Even  in  Umbria,  even  during  the 
life  of  Francis,  we  see  the  brave  experiment  fail. 
The  blinded  leader  dies,  his  five  wounds  testifying 
silently  not  only  his  devotion  to  his  Lord's  Passion, 
but  the  anguish  with  which  his  own  experience  has 
repeated  that  Passion,  as  he  has  watched  the  failure 
of  his  dream.  Behold  to  the  fore  that  valuable  person, 
Brother  Elias,  fussy  about  his  food,  sincerely  enthu- 
siastic concerning  the  true  interests  of  religion,  labor- 
ing with  zeal  and  success  to  transform  that  hilarious 
family,  which  had  lived  with  such  absurd  and  child- 
ish recklessness,  into  a  conventionally  efficient  mo- 
nastic army.  In  vain  the  Spirituals  protest  and  strug- 
gle ;  in  vain  the  old  spirit  flares  pathetically  like  the 
leaping  flame  in  an  expiring  lamp,  in  John  Parenti, 
John  of  Parma,  and  their  desperate  followers  during 
more  than  a  century.  Branded  as  heretics,  snubbed 
of  the  popes,  disowned  by  an  honestly  puzzled  Church, 
they  expiate,  in  prison  and  exile,  —  nay,  even  at  the 
stake,  —  the  crime  of  having  taken  literally  Francis  — 
and  Jesus. 

It  is  well  to  dwell  for  a  moment  on  the  struggle  of 
the  Spiritual  Franciscans  to  be  true  to  their  vows  ; 

224 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

for  here  is  no  dead  tale,  but  a  record  of  reality,  ever- 
living,  ever-renewed.  Theirs  was  simply  the  climax  of 
many  similar  attempts  during  the  Middle  Ages  lit- 
erally to  apply  the  teachings  given  by  the  Sea  of  Gal- 
ilee. Shortly  before  the  time  of  Francis,  not  to  go 
further  back,  the  Apostolics  of  Milan,  the  Poor  Men 
of  Lyons,  the  audacious  Arnold  of  Brescia,  all  sought, 
as  simply  as  he  had  done,  to  live  in  the  world  the  care- 
free life  the  Master  bade,  fulfilled  in  love  so  exalted 
that  justice  should  be  pardonably  superseded.  The 
pathetic  beauty  of  these  experiments  illumines  the 
gray  pages  of  church  history  with  a  brief  but  ineffec- 
tual radiance ;  for  their  story  is  an  unbroken  record 
of  defeat.  It  was  left  to  the  followers  of  Francis  to 
carry  the  fight  to  a  finish ;  and  a  gallant  fight  it  was. 
The  most  modern  experience  may  find  its  echo  in  the 
books  which  were  its  product,  "  Our  Lady  Poverty,'* 
the  "Mirror  of  Perfection,"  the  "  Fioretti,"  and  the 
wonderful  "  Lauds."  If  we  are  prone  to  sentimentalize 
over  the  thirteenth  century  and  to  think  that  the 
"religious  life  "  would  have  been  easier  then,  the  keen 
scornful  insight  of  these  quaint  old  books  may  well 
rebuke  us ;  for  in  old  Latin  or  modern  English,  the 
voice  of  the  world  speaks  a  language  quite  unchanged. 
If  we  read  the  cogent  arguments  presented  by  Avarice 
disguised  as  Prudence  to  the  followers  of  Lady  Pov- 
erty, we  shall  see  that  those  who  "  rejoiced  more  in  the 
nobility  of  want  than  if  they  had  had  an  abundance  of 
all  things,"  found  it  as  difficult  as  now  to  defend  their 
common  sense :  — 

225 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

In  what  could  it  hurt  you  to  have  the  necessaries  of  life, 
so  long  as  you  lack  all  superfluities  ?  For  in  peace  and  quiet- 
ness could  you  work  out  your  salvation  and  the  salvation 
of  mankind,  if  you  were  supplied  with  all  things  needful 
to  you.  Therefore  while  you  have  time  provide  for  your- 
selves and  them  that  shall  come  after  you.  .  .  .  "Would  God 
reject  you  because  you  had  wherewith  to  give  to  the  needy, 
when  He  Himself  has  said,  It  is  more  blessed  to  give  than 
to  receive  ?  .  .  .  You  need  fear  no  harm  from  the  posses- 
sion of  riches  so  long  as  you  all  count  them  as  nought.  There 
is  no  evil  in  things  themselves  but  only  in  the  soul  of  man, 
for  God  saw  all  things  and  they  were  good.  To  the  good  all 
things  are  good.  .  .  .  Oh  how  many,  having  possessions, 
use  them  evilly,  which  had  they  been  yours  would  have  been 
put  to  a  good  use,  for  holy  is  your  purpose,  holy  is  your 
desire!  .  .  . 

Clever  Avarice !  She  was  hard  put  to  it  for  a  time 
by  the  saint's  personal  friends,  sharp-tongued  Giles, 
and  that  fanatical  Pecorello  of  Francis,  Brother  Leo, 
who  certainly  showed  a  flash  of  "  the  wrath  of  the 
Lamb  "  when  he  knocked  down  the  marble  vase  placed 
by  Elias  at  Assisi  to  receive  offerings  for  that  church 
in  which  the  ideal  as  well  as  the  body  of  Francis  was 
buried.  But  she  won  out  in  the  end.  Early  in  the  four- 
teenth-century days  of  Michael  of  Cesena  she  was 
thoroughly  indorsed  by  the  sensible  Church  —  shall 
I  we  say  of  Christ,  or  of  Peter?  —  which  found  good 
and  sufficient  the  very  arguments  that  the  Francis- 
cans had  put  into  her  mouth.  Evangelical  Poverty, 
officially  repudiated  after  a  sharp  controversy,  retired 
from  the  scene.  She  kept,  to  be  sure,  a  little  of  her 

226 


THE  ETHICS  Ol  INEQUALITY 

old  honesty  in  academic  seclusion  for  a  time,  as  may 
be  seen  by  any  one  who,  searching  the  curiosities  of 
literature,  runs  across  the  startling  communistic  theo- 
ries of  Marsiglio  of  Padua  or  the  young  Wyclif ;  but 
for  the  most  part  she  was  travestied  by  the  hosts  of 
friars  parading  in  her  name  and  in  the  habit  of  Fran- 
cis. Within  less  than  two  centuries,  the  bravest  adven- 
ture to  follow  the  social  ethics  of  Jesus  which  history 
has  ever  known  had  made  total  shipwreck ;  the  Church 
was  richer  by  a  new  monastic  order,  destined  in  its 
turn  to  be  a  parasite  on  society,  and  the  world  was 
poorer  by  the  loss  of  an  ideal. 

Nevertheless,  in  the  fourteenth  century,  the  sturdy 
and  amazingly  interesting  ideals  of  the  schools  of 
Langland  outpass  Franciscanism  itself  in  one  respect. 
They  still  cling  to  that  standard  of  voluntary  poverty 
and  unstinted  service  which  was  the  steady  Counsel 
of  Perfection  to  the  medieval  mind.  But  in  the  con-  \ 
fused  poems  of  this  new  school,  we  hear  for  the  first 
time  the  Voice  of  the  Laborer,  and  it  dares  greatly. 
For  it  asserts  that  the  leader  of  the  haughty  feudal 
world  to  Truth  must  be  the  Ploughman,  and  that  the 
holiest  poverty  is  that  which  spends  its  time  not  in 
contemplative  ecstasy  but  in  productive  labor.  The 
horny  hands  of  the  workman  are  here  honored  more 
than  the  pierced  hands  of  the  mystic,  and  it  is  Peter 
the  common  man,  not  Peter  the  Pope,  who  holds  the 
keys  of  spiritual  power  and  advances  in  the  likeness 
of  the  Saviour  himself  with  the  marks  of  the  Passion 
upon  him.  The  startling  originality  of  this  conception 

227 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHAKACTER 

was  so  far  in  advance  of  its  day  that  we  cannot  won- 
der if  it  was  soon  completely  forgotten,  as  the  Middle 
Ages  drew  to  their  close. 

For  the  Renascence  dawns ;  and  its  proud  worldli- 
ness  and  individualistic  passion  put  back  for  many  a 
long  day  the  dial  of  poverty  and  labor.  No  one,  not 
even  himself,  took  seriously  Sir  Thomas  More,  Catho- 
lic martyr  and  socialist  philosopher,  when  at  the  outset 
of  the  period  he  dreamed  his  brave  dream  of  a  Utopia 
where  all  are  very  rich  by  virtue  of  all  being  poor; 
and  More's  curiously  blended  inspiration,  from  Plato, 
from  Jesus,  and  from  the  exhilaration  of  brave  dis- 
coveries in  distant  lands,  was  to  wait  many  an  age  for 
renewal. 

From  this  time  to  the  generation  of  our  own  fathers, 
the  social  conscience  slipped  into  the  background,  and 
the  Counsel  of  Perfection  in  social  ethics  was  quite 
forgotten.  The  worldly  enthusiasms  of  the  Renascence 
had  inhibited  it,  the  disgust  for  asceticism  in  the  Ref- 
ormation had  discredited  it.  By  the  eighteenth  century, 
Respectability  in  Crinoline  had  become  the  accredited 
running-mate  of  Religion;  and  as  for  Avarice,  she 
had  worn  the  disguise  of  Prudence  for  so  many  years 
that  she  had  really  forgotten  her  own  name,  and  moved 
through  society,  as  she  still  does,  at  ease  as  its  most 
valued  member. 

Yet  vibrations  once  caught  by  the  air  can  never 
die.  The  Quakers,  for  instance,  expressed  with  gentle 
obstinacy  the  old  uncompromising  ideal  of  detach- 
ment and  love.  In  good  middle  of  this  most  unprom- 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

ising  eighteenth  century,  their  view  finds  perhaps  its 
best  exponent  in  the  sober,  dauntless  appeal  of  that 
quaint  hero,  John  Woolman.  Was  an  early  Francis- 
can conceivably  reincarnate  in  this  broad-hatted  and 
gentle  dispeller  of  illusions,  the  American  colonist? 
Heading  the  record  of  his  "concerns,"  one  is  al- 
most tempted  to  think  so.  Only  it  imports  us  to  ob- 
serve that  another  new  note  has  by  this  time  entered 
the  siren  song  of  Poverty,  —  it  is  the  note  of  com- 
punction. Not  only  through  her  intrinsic  beauty  does 
she  now  call  men  to  follow  her:  Woolman  expe- 
riences to  the  full  that  horror  of  sharing  in  social  guilt 
which  we  are  wont  to  deem  wholly  modern.  With  no 
notion  of  running  away  from  civilization,  remaining 
in  ordinary  industrial  and  social  relations,  he  bent  his 
energy  to  avoid  injuring  his  brother.  To  this  end,  he 
traveled  steerage  in  unimaginable  horrors,  because 
his  ship's  cabin  had  been  decorated  by  slave-labor; 
walked  from  end  to  end  of  England  to  avoid  coun- 
tenancing the  cruelty  shown  the  post-boys  in  the 
chaises;  and  on  his  death-bed  refused  medicines  till 
assured  that  none  had  suffered  in  compounding  them. 
As  amusing  as  pitiful  were  his  efforts  to  abstain  from 
evil  and  to  lead  the  Christian  life  of  "plainness," 
mercy,  meekness,  in  a  world  where  all  the  threads  ran 
the  other  way.  But  Quakerism,  too,  outgrew  its  "  con- 
cerns," and  reduced  itself  by  degrees  to  an  affair  of 
speech  and  manner,  quite  compatible  with  the  pleasant 
conventionalities  of  existence. 

The  suave  materialism  of  the  nineteenth  century 
229 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

beard  no  troubling  echo  from  the  Gospel,  to  disturb 
the  comfortable  church-going  of  Vanity  Fair.  As  its 
decades  passed,  the  failure  of  all  attempts  literally  to 
follow  the  commands  of  Jesus  became  more  marked. 
The  last  attempt  to  realize  the  absolute  Christian 
ideal,  in  a  society  founded  on  economic  inequalities, 
was  probably  that  of  the  old  man  in  Russia,  trying 
so  earnestly  to  live  out  love  in  a  civilization  based  on 
self-defense,  and  breaking  away  at  the  last  moment 
like  a  wounded  creature,  to  die  as  he  dared  not  live. 
The  Portiuncula  at  Assisi  is  at  least  a  shrine  of  effec- 
tive prayer,  once  built  by  living  hands.  The  hut  at  Yas- 
naya  Polyana  does  but  commemorate  a  death.  In  the 
painful  futility  of  that  death  we  may  see  the  symbol 
of  all  modern  efforts  to  shake  off  the  social  fetters 
that  bind  us,  and  to  escape  into  a  purer  air  where  we 
may  be  free  from  the  burden  of  communal  guilt. 

So,  as  regards  the  Counsels  of  Perfection  no  less 
than  on  the  levels  of  everyday  life,  the  ideals,  for  the 
sake  of  which  religion  condones  the  present  order, 
do  but  suffer,  as  the  ages  pass,  an  increasing  bitter 
defeat. 

Defeat  is  the  glory  of  Christianity ;  but  there  is 
defeat  and  defeat.  Mere  dashing  one's  self  to  pieces 
against  law  and  fact  is  not  in  the  beneficent  purpose 
of  nature  nor  of  that  God  who  reveals  himself  in  na- 
ture. And  when  we  find  no  single  period  of  history 
in  which  we  can  point  to  success  in  the  attempt  to 
submit  the  whole  of  conduct  to  Christ's  commands, 
we  pause  and  think. 

230 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

For  the  more  ordinary  virtues,  so  fortunately  if 
illogically  prevalent,  must,  after  all,  stand  or  fall  with 
the  possibility  of  the  Counsels  of  Perfection.  Hunger 
after  the  Absolute  is  in  all  of  us.  Domestic  ameni- 
ties, moderation  in  self-seeking,  the  graces  of  charity, 
are  pleasant  things ;  but  unless  they  prophesy  a  practi- 
cable life  dedicated  without  reserve  or  limit,  no  justi- 
fication of  our  social  atrocities  can  be  based  on  them. 
Feeble  though  they  be,  they  might  reconcile  us  to  civil- 
ization could  we  hope  that  to  increase  them  would  lead 
us  out  of  bondage.  But  if  their  increase  be  their  de- 
struction we  must  conclude  that  an  ignoble  tragedy  of 
waste  sums  up  the  social  idealism  of  the  past. 


Let  us  moreover  be  candid.  There  is  something  to 
be  said  for  the  worldly  point  of  view  in  the  matter. 
Evolving  good  has  united  with  evil  in  discrediting 
the  effort  to  follow  the  Gospels  literally. 

Under  present  circumstances,  that  vital  and  cen- 
tral impulse  of  the  Christian  ideal,  the  substitution 
of  uncalculating  love  for  bargaining  justice,  is  not 
only  baffled ;  it  fails,  even  when  it  gets  a  chance,  to 
help  the  world  on  in  any  substantial  way.  This  dis- 
appointing fact  is  true  even  of  the  field  where  if  any- 
where pure  love  might  be  supposed  to  reign,  —  the 
relief  of  distress.  An  Associated  Charity  paid  agent 
is  a  less  sympathetic  figure  than  an  early  Franciscan, 
but  the  sick  and  poor  to  whom  she  ministers  fare 
better  than  the  lepers  of  old.  It  is  often  said  that 

231 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

modern  religious  orders  furnish  less  effective  nurs- 
ing than  businesslike  secular  agencies.  If  we  look  be- 
yond the  limited  appeal  of  those  whom  we  cheerfully 
describe  as  the  "  dependent,  defective  and  delinquent 
classes  "  to  the  wider  social  and  industrial  field,  the 
same  thing  holds.  To  live  on  free  gifts,  demanding 
nothing  and  giving  that  trifle,  one's  life,  in  return,  is 
a  thrilling  proposition ;  but  it  has  never  made  head- 
way in  getting  much  work  done.  It  was  all  very  well 
for  Francis  to  command  his  brothers  to  labor  with 
their  hands,  in  simple  Umbria.  Masseo  might  justify 
existence  by  picking  up  jobs  as  a  water-carrier,  and 
Giles  earn  his  rapts  by  lending  a  hand  at  the  harvest ; 
the  good  will  that  tossed  them  alms  had  no  scruples 
about  pauperizing  the  casual  laborer.  Yet  a  host  of 
mendicants,  however  eager  for  odd  jobs,  could  never 
have  formed  an  integral  part  of  the  industrial  army 
even  in  the  simply  articulated  medieval  days  ;  and 
persons  who  had  the  habit  of  falling  into  ecstasy  on 
the  highroad,  or  suddenly  retiring  to  a  mountain  for 
prayer,  would  be  a  still  more  doubtful  asset  in  a  mod- 
ern democracy. 

Services,  to  be  effective,  can  be  haphazard  as  little 
as  alms  ;  and  industrial  democracy  itself  has  taught  us 
that  only  an  external  necessity  has  ever  saved  them 
from  being  haphazard.  Justice  may  be  inferior  to 
love  as  an  impulse,  but  it  is  far  superior  as  a  social 
regulator,  and  the  "  business  efficiency "  which  we 
are  just  beginning  to  master,  involving  as  it  must 
the  nicest  conceivable  calculation  of  reciprocity  in  serv- 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

ices  and  rewards,  will  help  us  to  a  satisfactory  world 
far  more  swiftly  than  spontaneous  enthusiasm.  Bar- 
gaining, individual  and  collective,  is  at  the  present 
moment  a  necessity  of  economic  health.  In  reply  to 
those  heavenly  anarchists,  Francis,  Tolstoy,  and  their 
fellows,  sound  thought  has  one  final  answer.  So  far 
as  meeting  the  actual  situation  is  concerned,  their  code 
is  a  failure  practically  because  it  will  not  work. 

Spiritually  also  it  is  a  failure  because  it  presupposes 
for  its  existence  the  very  conditions  it  condemns.  Zeal 
in  amassing  and  maintaining  property  is  the  back- 
ground without  which  it  could  have  no  force.  The 
individual  practice  of  detachment  and  service  has 
always  implied  a  society  founded  on  inequalities  and 
organized  by  selfish  interests.  In  such  society,  the 
Counsels  of  Perfection  afford  a  delightful  contrast ; 
but  they  can  never  save  it,  for  they  run  counter  by  the 
very  terms  of  their  existence  to  its  most  fundamental 
and  creative  laws.  So  long  as  present  conditions  per- 
sist, we  may  expect  repeatedly  to  contemplate  the 
spectacle  of  a  sorrowing  Francis  handing  over  the  reins 
of  government  to  Brother  Elias ;  and  we  might  as  well 
applaud  the  instinct  which  deters  the  people  who  write 
most  eloquently  about  the  saint  from  trying  to  follow 
him  —  or  his  Master. 

So  we  have  been  forced,  by  the  mere  recognition  of 
facts,  to  face  the  profound  paradox  and  puzzle  which 
from  the  dawn  of  Christianity  has  weakened  the  reli- 
gious sense  of  Europe,  and  tended  to  make  the  precepts 
of  religion  food  for  the  hypocrite  and  the  cynic.  There 

233 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHAEACTER 

is  a  logical  reason  for  the  failure  of  these  precepts  just 
as  soon  as  they  come  out  into  the  open  and  seek  to 
save  the  world. 

For  it  was  not  in  jest  but  in  earnest  that  we  pointed 
out  in  the  last  chapter  the  stress  laid  by  modern  society 
on  the  virtues  that  constitute  practical  efficiency  and 
create  self-regarding  success. 

This  practical  stress  is  at  present  a  necessity. 
Though  it  has  now  reached  a  climax,  it  has  been 
prominent  in  the  whole  course  of  western  civilization ; 
and  it  differentiates  our  ethical  and  social  conditions 
from  those  of  the  East,  where  the  utilitarian  virtues 
have  always  been  at  a  discount.  Under  fixed  social 
institutions,  the  individual  who  felt  the  craving  for  the 
religious  life  could  gratify  it,  torn  by  no  agonizing 
conflict  between  his  duty  to  the  State  and  his  duty  to 
his  own  soul.  But  how  are  "  the  pride  of  life,  the  tire- 
less powers,"  in  which  the  West  has  gloried,  sustained? 
Through  the  pushing  eagerness  of  every  man  to  dis- 
tance his  fellows,  and  to  achieve  ownership  of  posses- 
sions great  or  small.  Self-assertion  has  been  more  than 
the  condition  of  personal  success ;  it  has  been  the  oil 
on  the  wheels,  —  nay,  we  may  go  farther,  the  motive 
power  of  the  whole  social  machine.  The  passivity  of 
the  non-resistant  has  been  recognized  by  thinkers  as 
a  peril  to  social  progress.  Mercy,  humility,  poverty  of 
spirit,  are  endearing  traits  in  weakling  or  parasite  ; 
they  may  even  be  permitted  to  the  strong  as  a  deco- 
rative adjunct  when  the  serious  business  of  life  has 
been  attended  to.  But  that  business  is  the  watchful 

234 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

care  of  one's  own  interests,  not  only  for  selfish  reasons, 
but  because  only  through  such  care  can  general  equi- 
librium and  progress  be  secured. 

Therefore,  while  our  present  social  basis  lasts,  the 
only  honest  solution  for  religion  is  the  monastic  theory 
which  asserts  perpetual  inconsistency  and  antagonism 
between  the  kingdom  of  God  and  the  kingdom  of  so- 
ciety and  nature.  Eastern  thought  has  always  been 
clear  in  the  matter.  Centrally  fatalistic,  and  unable 
to  conceive  of  social  progress,  it  has  from  time  im- 
memorial found  the  opportunity  of  sanctity  in  the  de- 
nial of  life.  This  position  the  instinct  of  the  western 
world  has  always  repudiated.  It  has  persisted  in  giving 
supreme  respect  to  the  principles  which  create  and  sus- 
tain society ;  but  while  it  so  persists  it  can  give  lip- 
homage  only  to  the  religious  ideals  of  self-effacement, 
and  the  time  has  come  for  it  to  face  facts  and  declare 
frankly  that  people  who  should  apply  the  Sermon  on 
the  Mount  with  thoroughness  could  have  no  produc- 
tive function,  under  present  conditions,  in  the  social 
whole. 

Yet  it  is  worth  noting  that  while  emphasis  on  the 
self-regarding  virtues  is  bolder  in  our  industrial  de- 
mocracy than  ever  it  was  before,  it  is  at  the  same  time 
left  far  more  than  in  the  past  without  philosophic 
foundation.  During  the  Middle  Ages,  this  emphasis 
was  checked  by  several  causes.  In  the  first  place,  a 
system  of  hereditary  social  distinctions,  in  which  each 
man  found  himself  moving  in  as  fixed  an  orbit  as  a 
star,  evidently  favored  obedience  to  the  spirit  of  the 

235 


THE  FUTUEE  OF  CHARACTER 

Master  and  escape  from  industrial  self-consciousness. 
In  the  second,  the  philosophy  which  underlay  monas- 
ticism,  as  it  underlay  the  Oriental  theories  with  which 
monasticism  was  allied,  sanctioned  the  divorce  of  virtue 
from  practical  usefulness.  When  the  world  was  pop- 
ularly viewed  as  a  creation  of  the  Devil  and  an  enemy 
of  the  soul,  it  was  reasonable  and  right  that  religious 
virtues  should  be  assumed  to  contribute  to  the  destruc- 
tion rather  than  to  the  prosperity  and  permanence  of 
the  social  order.  The  Christian  did  well  to  withdraw 
as  far  as  was  practicable  from  action :  the  law  of  re- 
nunciation and  sacrifice  was  expected  naturally  to  lead 
to  social  inefficiency ;  and  we  face  without  surprise  as 
we  look  back  the  curious  phenomenon  of  two  powers 
confronting  each  other  in  opposition  not  logically  sus- 
tained but  always  latent,  —  the  World,  going  on  its 
ancient  way  of  lust  and  chaffering,  and  Christianity, 
drawing  its  most  ardent  disciples  away  from  Vanity 
Fair,  into  the  hush  of  an  existence  where  action  was 
suspended  and  self  was  lost,  that  it  might  find  itself 
in  God. 

There  were  perplexity  and  inconsistency  enough  in 
that  situation.  But  we  face  greater  perplexity  and 
inconsistency  to-day,  as  the  Manichaean  attitude  has 
become  discredited,  and  we  have  ceased  to  regard  na- 
ture and  social  life  as  lures  of  the  Devil.  For  we  are 
learning  to  consider  social  well-being  a  sacred  thing, 
and,  as  a  primary  duty,  so  to  shape  our  activities  that 
they  may  minister  to  it.  This  well-being  must  be  the 
product  of  the  sum  total  of  human  normal  energies, 

236 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INEQUALITY 

and  to  attain  it  by  restoring  their  earth-heritage  to  all 
men  has  become  a  religious  aim.  No  ideal,  therefore, 
which  contradicts  the  sustaining  principles  of  society 
can  have  religious  worth,  especially  if  its  existence 
depends  on  the  permanence  of  the  forces  it  condemns. 
As  the  instinct  of  the  West  thus  intrenches  itself  in 
reasoned  conviction,  the  paradox  by  which  the  virtues 
which  religion  most  honors  are  seen  to  function  as  a 
destructive  or  at  best  a  negative  force  flashes  out  in 
all  its  naked  cruelty  to  thinking  minds  ;  and  the  con- 
flict between  the  ideals  of  personal  holiness  and  of 
social  efficiency  undermines  faith  and  drives  men  to 
despair.  Leave  the  present  order  intact,  and  no  im- 
pulse subsisting  as  a  tolerated  exception  within  it  can 
ever  to  an  appreciable  degree  possess  regenerative 
force.  But  if  religion  be  not  a  regenerative  force, 
what  is  it  ? 

So  long  as  social  inequalities  prevail,  the  produc- 
tive individual  must  make  self  -  protection  his  first 
object.  If  he  refuses  to  do  so,  he  is  at  best  a  futile 
fanatic,  at  worst  he  dislocates  the  social  structure. 
Therefore  it  is  that,  making  literally  a  virtue  of 
necessity,  we  laud  the  measuring  spirit  without  which 
it  would  seem  impossible  to  prosper,  and  encourage 
Benevolence  itself  to  nestle  under  the  wing  of  Calcu- 
lation. Therefore  it  is  that  the  more  clamorous  grow 
our  claims  on  the  universe,  the  more  solemnly  we 
proffer  them  in  the  name  of  social  duty,  and  point 
out  that  the  welfare  of  the  race  depends  on  our  pur- 
suing them  undisturbed.  That  the  logic  of  the  situa- 

237 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

tion  is  becoming  frankly  recognized  is  at  least  an 
advantage.  The  time  has  come  for  the  social  conserv- 
ative to  take  open  stand  on  a  philosophy  to  which 
unworldliness  and  unselfishness  are  at  most  a  mere 
by-play.  He  should  join  fearless  and  honest  radicals 
like  Lowes  Dickinson  and  Laveleye  in  their  assertion 
that  the  victory  of  Christianity  would  mean  the  sui- 
cide of  civilization. 

So  do  the  ethics  of  inequality  refute  the  very  ideal 
which  it  was  claimed  that  they  alone  could  foster.  And 
so  does  the  Apologia  of  Religion  end  in  a  reductio  ad 
absurdum. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  ETHICS   OF   EQUALITY 


THE  ethics  of  inequality  have  proved  on  inspection 
always  unsatisfactory,  progressively  rotten.  Where 
these  have  so  signally  failed,  can  the  ethics  of  equality 
hope  to  succeed  ? 

The  thing  is  thinkable.  "Were  Religion,  even  at  her 
most  exacting,  to  find  her  needs  more  fully  met  in  the 
new  order  than  ever  before,  it  would  not  be  the  first 
time  that  the  foe  she  had  bitterly  fought  has  turned 
out  to  be  a  friend  competent  to  reveal  to  her  "  new 
depths  of  the  divine." 

For  what  if  we  were  moving  toward  a  state  of  things 
in  which  the  laws  of  religious  ethics  were  to  become 
the  fundamental  laws  of  social  health?  Nothing  less 
than  this  is  the  transformation  contemplated  by  social- 
ism. It  proposes  to  translate  the  deepest  principles  of 
religious  achievement  into  terms  of  social  efficiency, 
and  to  achieve  a  true  reconciliation  and  harmony 
between  two  ways  of  life  always  heretofore  deemed 
incompatible. 

The  way  of  renunciation  the  way  of  freedom  !  That 
was  the  last  word  in  our  discussion  of  socialist  self-dis- 
ciplines. How  long  Religion  has  uttered  it !  With  what 
desperation,  and  against  what  heavy  odds,  at  least 

239 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

in  the  western  world,  has  she  clung  to  it!  Sacrifice, 
renunciation,  are  a  necessity  to  self-realization  so  in- 
ward that  they  can  never  be  rejected  nor  exhausted ; 
it  has  been  left  for  the  cooperative  commonwealth  to 
place  them  on  a  firm  basis  by  revealing  them  as  the 
law  of  social  no  less  than  of  individual  welfare.  For 
that  commonwealth  as  we  have  already  seen  will  sum- 
mon men  to  practice  them,  not  as  a  private  luxury 
and  not  as  an  act  of  self-immolation  to  a  Setebos,  but 
in  the  name  of  the  larger  social  self,  of  which  the  func- 
tions can  only  be  performed  as  the  individual  joyously 
surrenders  all  claim  to  special  privilege,  and  finds  in 
subordination  his  true  liberty. 

He  who  loses  his  life  shall  find  it !  Even  in  nature 
we  begin  to  perceive  this  hidden  law,  and  we  shall 
probably  discover  it  more  and  more  clearly  there  as 
science  advances.  But  in  the  life  of  humanity  we  may 
look  for  its  perfect  triumph,  —  humanity,  that  has 
clung  to  it  with  passion  even  when  it  most  seemed  to 
contradict  all  social  progress,  and  to  lead  its  votary 
toward  a  self-centred  and  cloistered  virtue,  that  dwelt 
afar  from  the  habitations  of  men  and  from  all  pro- 
ductive power.  This  law,  gradually  accomplishing  its 
secret  work  within  the  hearts  of  men,  even  while  eco- 
nomic change  transforms  their  environment,  must  in 
due  time  so  reshape  the  social  structure  that  individ- 
ual sin  need  no  longer  be  a  social  merit,  nor  individual 
holiness  be,  socially  speaking,  a  negative  and  unfruit- 
ful source.  Such  reshaping  implies  social  equality  ;  for 
inequality  must  forever  thwart  the  operation  of  the  law. 

240 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

II 

Now  let  us  transport  ourselves  by  an  act  of  imagina- 
tion into  the  socialized  state,  bearing  in  mind  as  we 
do  so  the  obstinate  inconsistency  between  the  Christian 
craving  for  a  social  order  in  which  services  and  rewards 
shall  have  been  released  from  bondage  to  reasoned 
equity,  and  the  experience  of  the  ages  that  only  such 
equity  of  the  sternest  type  can  maintain  social  well- 
being. 

We  are  in  a  civilization  which  has  for  the  first  time 
in  history  planted  itself  on  sustained  equality  of  eco- 
nomic opportunity.  Not  that  either  equality  or  in- 
equality can  ever  be  absolute ;  but  socialists  work  for 
so  steady  a  check  on  the  accumulated  and  inherited 
privilege  which  has  marked  society  up  to  date  that 
we  may  assume  a  change  in  balance  and  emphasis 
marked  enough  to  justify  us  in  thinking  of  equality 
as  the  keynote  of  the  future.  In  this  new  order,  men, 
not  profits,  have  become  the  end  of  production,  and 
we  have  learned  that  "  there  is  no  wealth  but  life." 
The  probable  conditions  of  labor  are  best  suggested 
by  an  industrial  conscription,  exact  as  military  con- 
scriptions are  now:  it  will  be  based  on  enlightened 
observation  of  the  youth  during  his  vocational  training, 
and  on  close  tests  aimed  to  secure  the  highest  degree 
of  "scientific  efficiency  " ;  and  it  will  of  course  admit, 
as  a  primary,  though  not  as  an  exclusive  factor,  his 
own  desires.  When  once  he  is  settled  in  his  post,  the 
quota  of  service  to  be  rendered  will  be  determined 

241 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

by  a  far-seeing  policy,  destined  to  supply  a  man's  due 
share  toward  the  ascertained  needs  of  the  community, 
and  to  gain  from  him  the  largest  product  compatible 
with  his  well-being  of  mind  and  body. 

While  he  works,  he  will  receive  from  the  general 
store,  with  no  personal  haggling,  what  he  needs  to 
keep  him  at  this  point.  The  amount  will  vary  accord- 
ing to  the  personal  factor  and  the  social  cost.  It  will 
differ  greatly  in  different  cases,  but  it  will  probably 
be  more  equal  and  will  certainly  be  more  ascertain- 
able  than  we  now  suppose.  It  must  be  determined 
through  scientific  study  of  the  art  of  living,  not  as 
now  through  frantic  balancing  of  values  in  themselves 
incommensurable.  The  man  may  choose  to  work  more 
than  his  quota ;  if  so,  let  him  receive  more.  He  may 
be  recalcitrant  and  lazy ;  if  so,  let  him  receive  less, 
—  as  he  would  do  under  like  circumstances  to-day, 
unless  he  happen  to  be  a  member  of  the  parasitical 
classes. 

Thus,  in  the  world  to  which  our  imagination  has 
transported  us,  the  anxious  task  of  measuring  serv- 
ices and  rewards  will  not  be  ignored,  but  it  will 
be  removed  from  the  shoulders  of  the  individual  to 
those  of  the  community,  and  carried  on  by  collective 
decisions,  resting  of  course  on  democratic  control. 
And  soon  it  will  come  to  pass  that  a  system  where 
every  man  foraged  for  his  own  job  will  look  as  bar- 
barous in  retrospect  as  the  still  more  primitive  and 
individualistic  law  of  the  jungle.  The  compulsion 
under  which  men  will  work  will  be  steady,  but  it  will 

242 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

be  unobtrusive,  and  consistent  with  a  sense  of  effective 
freedom,  and  an  Hellenic  "  spontaneity  of  conscious- 
ness." They  can  deflect  their  interests  as  much  as 
they  choose  from  self-seeking  and  material  cares ;  for 
they  will  no  more  attempt  to  make  industrial  bargains 
than  to  determine  the  amount  of  fresh  air  required 
by  their  lungs.  Nature  will  decide  in  the  one  case, 
society  in  the  other ;  and  people  will  find  it  far  easier 
than  now  to  carry  into  their  appointed  work  the  ener- 
gies of  free  service,  while  in  whatever  supererogatory 
energies  they  may  choose,  they  can  help  and  not  hinder 
the  large  activities  by  which  civilization  is  sustained. 
That  justice  which  is  to-day  the  central  demand  of 
socialism  will  be  the  informing  principle  of  the  whole 
cooperative  commonwealth,  inevitable  as  the  control 
of  gravitation  over  material  atoms.  It  will  replace  the 
free  fierce  conflict  between  self-interest  and  love  in 
which  love  gets  so  systematically  the  worst  of  it  through 
the  ages.  But  the  individual  will  no  longer  be  under 
the  degrading  necessity  of  determining  his  own  rela- 
tions toward  justice  ;  and  in  the  predetermined  rhythm 
pervading  all  social  relations,  he  can  find,  if  he  will, 
the  highest  opportunities  of  love. 

Would  not  such  a  state  satisfy  the  blind  groping 
of  the  ages  better  than  any  which  has  preceded  ? 

Never  mind  for  the  moment  just  how  it  is  to  be 
brought  about.  So  far  as  outward  methods  go,  income 
and  inheritance  taxes  could  inaugurate  it  in  three 
generations.  But  we  know  that  the  real  power  to  educe 
it  must  be  the  enlightened  common  will.  And  that 

243 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  time  of  our  preparation  is  not  accomplished  is 
proved  by  the  incredulity  with  which  the  average  man 
receives  the  suggested  picture.  Our  modern  abnor- 
mal conditions  have  so  dulled  his  imagination  that 
he  cannot  conceive  labor  faithfully  performed  except 
under  the  whip.  As  matters  go  now,  he  is  right.  Adam 
Bede,  working  cheerily  at  his  door  when  all  his  mates 
have  struck  work  at  the  click  of  the  clock,  is  a  de- 
lightful spectacle  which  George  Eliot  rightly  bids  us 
admire ;  but  Adam  will  always  be  the  exception  under 
wage -slavery.  When  the  boarder  in  "The  Thiid 
Floor  Back  "  insists  on  paying  his  landlady  more  than 
she  asks,  we  think  it  quite  right  that  his  coming  should 
be  heralded  by  a  halo. 

Yet  the  instincts  of  Adam  and  "  The  Third  Floor 
Back "  are  entirely  normal.  Wherever  they  have  a 
chance  —  and  that  is  wherever  the  industrial  blight 
has  not  struck  us  —  they  obtain  to-day.  It  is  this 
blight  which  sickens  all  voluntary  energies  and  spon- 
taneous gratitudes,  and  almost  deludes  us  all  into 
thinking  that  the  chief  end  of  man  is  to  do  as  little 
and  get  as  much  as  he  can.  The  vicious  lie  is  refuted 
whenever  the  more  wholesome  instincts,  the  desire 
to  create  and  to  share,  have  permission  to  flourish. 
Granted  sufficient  incentive,  men  always  work  hardest 
when  there  is  no  master  to  drive  them  :  the  most  effect- 
ual service  in  all  higher  ranges  of  activity,  such  as 
science,  art,  letters,  inventions,  explorations,  is  ren- 
dered by  people  whose  economic  background  is  secure. 
Would  it  not  be  worth  while  to  watch  what  happens 

244 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

in  the  lower  ranges  under  the  same  security  ?  To  try 
the  brave  experiment,  we  need  only  shift  the  centre 
of  consciousness  from  reward,  where  it  now  must  be 
focused  if  a  man  is  to  respect  his  manhood,  to  those 
other  factors,  —  pleasure  in  the  process  and  in  the  re- 
sult, —  always  present  in  all  normal  labor,  and  dom- 
inant when  they  get  a  chance. 

Is  there  another  objection  ?  Is  it  feared  that  condi- 
tions so  inevitable  will  carry  with  them  no  moral  power  ? 
In  rejoinder  we  may  note  that  as  society  evolves  the 
test  of  character  is  increasingly  found  less  in  the  crea- 
tion than  in  the  use  of  conditions.  Back  to  our  economic 
determinism  again !  Acquiescence  in  what  life  offers 
may  be  an  expression  of  either  servile  bondage  or  spir- 
itual liberty.  Under  like  bereavements,  one  mourner 
becomes  a  pitiable  egotist,  —  another  "  buys  up  the  op- 
portunity "  to  be  perfected  in  sympathy  and  patience. 
Our  freedom  is  never  substantial  nor  secure  till  we 
have  learned  that  its  true  measure  is  not  circum- 
stance, favorable  or  adverse,  but  the  spirit  which  we 
infuse  into  circumstance. 

Doubtless  many  people  will  fail  to  realize  the  moral 
opportunities  of  the  new  order.  They  will  miss  the 
point,  forfeit  their  chance,  and  perform  their  appointed 
functions  in  the  socialist  state  with  as  dogged  a  stu- 
pidity as  their  fellows  show  in  our  industrial  chaos 
to-day.  But  others  will  be  of  keener  flair.  It  will  be 
open  to  men  to  carp  and  cavil  at  the  whole  system, 
and  to  smart  under  a  constant  sense  of  injustice.  So 
there  will  always  be  dyspeptics,  fussily  measuring 

245 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  fate  of  every  mouthful  they  eat.  But  we  may 
trust  that  social  health  will  be  the  rule,  and  self- 
scrutiny  in  productive  activities  the  morbid  excep- 
tion. 

And  who  can  doubt  that  in  a  system  where  the 
haphazard  parries  of  employers  and  employed  should 
be  replaced  by  social  estimates  of  the  worth  of  labor, 
healthful  influences  would  prevail?  When  we  have 
eliminated  that  craving  for  private  wealth  which  is 
so  largely  born  from  fear  of  want,  yet  so  corrosive, 
every  service  may  be  rendered  as  a  voluntary  gift, 
and  every  reward  accepted  as  an  act  of  thanks  to 
the  general  bounty;  and  the  pleasant  reciprocities  al- 
ready current  in  artistic  and  intellectual  spheres  may 
be  repeated  in  the  sphere  of  industry.  "Forsooth, 
brothers,  fellowship  is  heaven  and  lack  of  fellowship 
is  hell,"  said  William  Morris.  From  that  hell,  only  so- 
cialism can  set  us  free,  for  only  under  socialism  can 
the  meek  effectively  inherit  that  earth  which  shall 
nourish  them  unstintedly  from  the  resources  which  it 
will  be  their  privilege,  in  the  serious  and  instinctive 
joy  of  fellowship,  to  maintain  and  to  increase. 

Ill 

Now  let  us  consider  more  closely  how  the  virtues  of 
the  lowlands  will  thrive  in  the  new  country. 

How  about  the  sweet  ministries  of  charity,  —  a 
little  soured  to-day,  but  cherished  still  ?  Sir  Thomas 
Browne,  beloved  philosopher,  may  bring  us  cheer : 
"  I  hold  not  soe  narrow  a  conceit  of  this  vertue  as  to 

246 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

conceive  that  to  give  almes  is  onelie  to  be  charitable, 
or  thinke  a  piece  of  Liberality  can  comprehend  the 
Totall  of  Charitie.  .  .  .  There  are  infirmities  not 
onelie  of  body  but  of  Soule  and  fortunes,  which  doe 
require  the  mercif  ull  hand  of  our  abilities.  ...  It  is 
no  greater  Charitie  to  cloath  the  Body  than  to  aparell 
the  Nakedness  of  the  Soule." 

It  is  an  index  to  our  modern  degradation  that 
money  doles  occur  first  when  charity  is  mentioned. 
Not  with  such  largesse  did  the  Franciscans  deal.  Not 
of  such  was  Paul  thinking  when  he  praised  a  power 
which  forbears  patiently,  knows  neither  envy  nor 
vanity,  never  tolerates  bad  manners,  and  rejoices  only 
in  the  truth.  Pure  charts,  contemplated  by  the  apostle, 
is  a  quality  that  may  or  may  not  inspire  the  more 
limited  charity  of  our  acquaintance ;  but  it  transcends 
that  pedestrian  virtue  and  has  far  broader  field  for 
exercise.  It  is  less  an  activity  which  we  exert  than  a 
spiritual  atmosphere  ;  and  "  to  live  in  perfect  charity 
with  all  men "  is  an  exercise  sufficiently  interesting 
and  varied  to  keep  every  one  healthfully  busy.  If  the 
hymn  be  right,  charity  will  continue  with  us  into 
eternity,  and  still  have  ample  range  when  faith  and 
hope  are  ended  and  material  gifts  no  longer  have  any 
point,  among  the  fair  equities  of  that  New  Jerusalem 
which  is  still  illumined  by  the  light  of  sacrifice  pro- 
ceeding from  the  Lamb  as  It  had  been  slain. 

William  Blake  has  a  curious  suggestion  in  one  of 
his  pictorial  meditations  on  the  Book  of  Job.  The 
patriarch,  on  whom  the  disasters  robbing  him  of  all 

247 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

his  wealth  have  already  fallen,  sits  in  idyllic  peace, 
and  with  gracious  gesture  hands  a  part  of  his  last  loaf 
to  a  blind  beggar,  while  gentle  angels  on  either  side 
clasp  hands  in  admiration.  We  should  say,  a  touch- 
ing delineation  of  generosity  to  the  uttermost.  But 
why,  then,  in  that  upper  half  of  the  picture  which 
represents  through  the  series  the  world  of  heavenly 
realities  corresponding  to  the  world  of  appearance 
below,  are  angels  affrighted,  the  heavens  racked,  the 
Throne  shaken  by  the  Adversary  Satan,  who  circles 
around  it  in  a  whirlwind  of  flame,  while  the  halo 
about  the  head  of  God  turns  black  ?  Nowhere  else 
in  the  series  does  evil  threaten  to  overthrow  the 
equilibrium  of  the  celestial  sphere.  The  motto  around 
the  picture  is  that  of  material  charity :  "  Did  not  I 
weep  for  him  who  was  in  trouble  ?  Was  not  my  soul 
afflicted  for  the  poor  ?  "  And  we  are  forced  by  the 
context  to  agree  with  the  interpretation  of  the  engrav- 
ing given  by  Mr.  Wicksteed,  who  bids  us  believe 
that  Job  here  commits  an  error  that  almost  turns 
heaven  into  hell :  "  This  error  of  Job's  is  itself  an 
effect  of  his  materialism.  It  is  Job's  belief  that  we 
can  have  property  in  the  material  necessities  of  life  — 
4  in  what  is  common  to  all  in  Christ's  kingdom/  to 
quote  Blake  once  more  —  that  misleads  him.  .  .  . 
The  arrogation  of  the  right  to  bestow  on  our  fellow 
men  the  material  necessities  of  life  is  a  usurpation  by 
the  Satanic  selfhood  of  the  bounty  of  heaven."  "  He 
who  performs  works  of  mercy,"  says  Blake  again 
somewhere,  "is  punished  and  if  possible  destroyed  not 

248 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

through  envy,  hatred,  or  malice,  but  through  self- 
righteousness,  that  thinks  it  does  God  service,  which 
God  is  Satan." 

Startling  comments  on  a  startling  picture  ;  but  does 
not  life  indorse  them  ?  We  have  already  suggested 
that  to  dispense  material  charity  does  all  but  habit- 
ually coarsen  and  blunt,  and  tends  to  engender  either 
false  complacency  or  mean  distrust.  The  largesse  of 
self  to  impoverished  hearts  and  minds  is  subject  to  no 
such  dangers  ;  it  renders  more  humble,  more  delicate, 
more  reverent,  more  trustful.  The  endless  possibilities 
in  such  largesse  are  revealed  by  the  growing  intui- 
tions of  democracy.  They  can  be  opened  only  as  class 
is  overcome  and  mechanical  barriers  between  men 
destroyed. 

The  external  manifestations  of  charity  to-day  are  at 
their  best  but  hints  and  shadows  of  that  more  spiritu- 
alized generosity  for  which  the  ethics  of  social  equality 
will  call.  Compassion  is  probably  the  finest  expres- 
sion charity  knows ;  it  is  the  fairest  flower  of  Christ- 
ianity, a  virtue  all  but  unknown  to  paganism,  and 
it  is  the  dominant  mood  to-day  with  people  who  have 
eyes  and  ears.  Socialism  promises  to  relieve  us  at  first 
from  the  burden  of  an  intolerable  pity.  We  shall  be 
no  longer  haunted  in  summer  by  the  aching  conscious- 
ness of  the  poor  in  great  cities,  of  the  thronged  fac- 
tories, the  dying  sick,  the  languishing  children.  It  is 
conceivable  that  when  these  horrors  shall  be  ended 
reaction  may  set  in ;  tenderness  may  droop  for  a  time 
as  well-being  spreads,  and  a  reckless  indifferentism 

249 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

invade  us.  But  the  instincts  which  the  sharp  modern 
stress  has  developed  as  its  noblest  product  will  not  be 
so  lightly  lost.  They  will  revive,  and  work  in  subtler 
ways  than  we  now  experience. 

For  of  course  suffering  will  not  be  eliminated  by 
socialism,  and  just  as  pangs  that  ravage  modern  souls 
would  have  been  strange  to  a  contemporary  of  Virgil, 
so  new  sorrows  will  torture  the  sensitive  race  to  be. 
Take,  for  instance,  the  most  obvious  and  external  of 
woes.  As  people  in  general  grow  healthier  and  there- 
fore more  comely,  —  and  we  may  note  that  doctors 
are  promising  us  this  pleasant  change,  independently 
of  economic  systems,  —  each  lapse  from  personal 
beauty  will  be  more  keenly  felt,  and  quicken  more 
distaste  in  the  vulgar,  more  pity  in  the  refined.  Nowa- 
days ugly  men  or  women  are  in  too  large  a  majority 
to  suffer  unduly;  but  should  the  extraordinary  sor- 
didness  of  our  .average  aspect  be  replaced  by  an  alert 
radiance  bespeaking  health  and  good -breeding,  the 
exceptional  person  will  need  courage  to  adjust  him- 
self, and  will  evoke  varying  treatment  from  his  fel- 
lows. 

Mental  and  moral  defects  also  will  offer  a  new 
scope  for  chivalry.  For  it  is  foolish  to  suppose  that 
psychical  inequalities  will  disappear  with  economic. 
In  our  fevered  generation,  the  non-productive  and 
irresponsible  person  —  provided  only  that  his  money 
comes  from  the  dead  hand  —  encounters  little  con- 
tempt. Often  we  envy  him,  for  we  are  possessed  our- 
selves by  hunger  for  repose.  But  hunger  to  create  will 

250 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

dominate  the  world  in  the  better  time  to  be ;  and 
since  opportunities  are  to  be  roughly  equal  while 
powers  remain  unequal,  people  who  fail  will  no  longer 
be  able  comfortably  to  shelter  themselves  under  the 
enervating  delusion  of  circumstance.  A  fine  chance, 
theirs,  for  humility,  —  and  for  their  abler  fellows,  for 
all  delicacies  of  respectful  pity.  One  hopes,  at  least, 
that  the  pity  will  remain  respectful,  —  but  foresees 
risk  of  suotle  temptations  on  both  sides.  The  clear 
light  of  the  socialized  state  will  thus  dispel  many  con- 
fusions that  now  obscure  real  values,  and  sweep  away 
the  cherished  consolations  of  weaklings;  and  men 
will  carry  on  under  more  searching  conditions  than  ever 
before  the  ceaseless  dual  battle  against  self-contempt 
and  self-conceit. 

Meantime,  bereavement,  separation,  thwarted  affec- 
tion, the  struggle  of  the  spirit  forever  seeking  and 
forever  missing  its  goal,  the  very  pain  of  fmiteness,  will 
stab  as  cruelly  as  now,  and  call  for  perpetual  efforts 
to  enlighten,  console,  and  heal.  Indeed,  the  pathos  Of 
human  existence  shivering  between  two  eternities  will 
become  constantly  plainer,  as  the  accidental  and  pre- 
ventable are  eliminated  from  our  lot. 

IV 

Starting  to  consider  the  aristocratic  virtues  that 
stoop,  we  have  been  led  to  consider  the  humble  virtues 
that  endure.  This  is  not  strange,  for  the  qualities  of 
privilege  and  of  want  will  be  less  separate  under  social 
democracy  than  now. 

251 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

As  already  noted,  modern  morals  are  as  subject  to 
class  divisions  as  are  manners  or  men.  It  would  be  as 
inadvisable  for  a  poor  man  to  develop  an  autocratic 
temper  as  for  a  rich  man  to  practice  non-resistance  in 
his  business.  One  type  of  virtue  —  the  more  Christian 

—  has  been  considered  becoming  to  the  lower  classes  ; 
another,  more  Pagan,  has  been  the  chief  adornment 
of  the  upper. 

Now  even  democracy  does  not  countenance  this  sort 
of  thing,  and  as  for  socialism,  it  looks  forward  to 
equality  of  opportunity  in  ethics  as  well  as  economics. 
It  demands  that  attitudes  proved  admirable  in  the 
specialized  product  of  either  poverty  or  privilege  be 
thrown  open  as  the  common  heritage. 

Take,  for  instance,  the  most  aristocratic  of  virtues, 

—  a  high  magnanimous  scorn  of  material  rewards. 
This  is  not  unknown  among  the  poor,  yet,  apart  from 
plutocrats  and  nouveaux  riches,  it  has  always  been 
the  hall  -  mark  of  a  genuine  and  stable  aristocracy. 
Spenser  voices    the  mood    through  his    Sir  Guyon. 
Thus  the  knight  replies  with  chivalric  impatience  to 
the  allurements  of  "  Great  Mammon,"  "  God  of  the 
world  and  wordlings,"  who  sits   in  his  gloomy  glade 
surrounded  by  great  heaps  of  gold :  — 

"  Mammon,"  said  he,  "  thy  godhead's  vaunt  is  vain, 
Aud  idle  offers  of  thy  golden  fee  : 
To  them  that  covet  such  eye-glutting  gain 
Proffer  thy  gifts,  and  fitter  servants  entertain  I 

"  Me  ill  besits,  that  in  der-doing  arms 
And  honour's  suit,  my  vowed  days  do  spend, 

252 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

Unto  thy  bounteous  baits  and  pleasing  charms 

With  which  weak  men  thou  witchest  to  attend. 

Regard  of  worldly  muck  doth  foully  blend 

And  low  abase  the  high  heroic  sprite 

That  joys  for  crowns  and  kingdom  to  contend: 

Faire  shields,  gay  steeds,  bright  armes,  be  my  delight 

These  be  the  riches  fit  for  an  adventurous  knight  I " 

Contempt  for  the  God  of  Greed  has  always  been  the 
prerogative  of  your  true  aristocrat,  as  it  still  is  in 
the  professional  strata  of  society ;  but  we  find  it  hard 
to  associate  with  our  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of 
water.  Yet  why?  Should  not  the  very  aim  of  a  demo- 
cracy be  to  put  this  splendid  attitude  within  the  reach 
of  those  whose  services  are  not  associated  with  fair 
shields  and  gay  steeds,  but  with  ploughshares  and 
tools?  Is  there  any  intrinsic  reason  why  a  man  who 
digs  potatoes  or  tends  machines  should  not  dwell  in  as 
lofty  a  region  of  self -disregard  as  he  who  teaches  the 
nation's  youth  or  fights  the  nation's  wars  ?- 

The  past  would  have  said,  Yes.  Behind  our  old 
social  inequalities,  and  sustaining  them,  lay  the  ancient 
instinct  to  regard  the  natural  world  as  common  and 
unclean,  and  those  who  ministered  to  physical  necessi- 
ties as  naturally  inferior.  Even  Plato  felt  an  inherent 
vulgarity  in  manual  pursuits.  So  long  as  this  instinct 
persisted,  the  best  in  the  attitude  of  the  aristocrat  was 
of  course  closed  to  the  world's  workers.  Slowly,  im- 
perceptibly, we  moderns  are  learning  to  spiritualize 
our  conception  of  nature,  and  as  we  do  so,  we  begin 
to  accord  to  labor,  at  least  verbally,  the  respect  which 
is  its  due  in  a  universe  where  every  common  bush  is 

253 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  CHARACTER 

afire  with  God.  There  is  even  danger  lest  our  talk  of 
the  dignity  of  labor  degenerate  into  cant.  The  only 
way  to  prevent  this  catastrophe  is  to  gain  a  more  demo- 
cratic conception  of  the  virtues,  and  to  insist  on  putting 
within  the  reach  of  all  that  care-free  chivalric  atti- 
tude once  supposed  to  be  the  prerogative  of  a  favored 
class. 

In  like  fashion,  might  not  the  socialist  state  open 
to  every  one  the  virtues  chiefly  fostered  to-day  in  pov- 
erty? One  would  suppose  so:  for  in  this  state,  the 
type  of  serene  poverty  which  Jesus  blessed  and  en- 
joined would  be  practically  Ihe  self-respecting  common 
lot.  Moreover,  those  searching  disciplines  to  be  ex- 
pected would  place  a  high  premium  on  the  qualities  of 
obedience  and  submission,  once  scornfully  dubbed  the 
virtues  of  slaves,  now  considered  as  the  highest  glory 
of  those  whom  the  Truth  has  made  free. 

Nothing,  indeed,  which  has  enduring  value  in  the 
ethics  of  inequality  on  either  side  need  be  forfeited  by 
equality  of  opportunity.  The  old  morality  will  be  the 
same  as  ever ;  but  it  will  be  put  on  a  basis  of  truth  in- 
stead of  accident,  subjected  to  more  searching  tests  than 
before,  and  made  in  its  rich  entirety  the  heritage  of  all. 
"  Enrichment "  is  the  chief  word  that  occurs  to  one,  in 
thinking  of  the  ethical  life  of  the  future.  Despite  our 
fond  delusion  of  freedom,  class-barriers  now  hamper 
us  at  a  thousand  points.  We  are  too  used  to  them 
to  realize  our  bondage ;  but  we  need  only  imagine  a 
world  where  all  share  the  same  class-traditions  and 
similar  education  is  open  to  all,  to  foresee  a  wider  and 

254 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

richer  culture  of  the  Fruits  of  the  Spirit  than  ever 
before. 

Sympathy  —  which  is  the  Greek  form  of  the  Latin 
compassion  —  is  the  chief  psychic  force  leading  us 
toward  the  socialist  state,  and  sympathy  must  be  the 
central  inspiration  when  we  get  there.  Our  current  use 
touchingly  reflects  our  impression  that  to  feel  with  a 
fellow  mortal  must  be  to  grieve  with  him ;  but  social- 
ism hopes  to  revive  a  larger  implication.  Sympathy 
might  illumine  every  "virtue  of  delight  "  with  a  new 
beauty ;  each  detail  of  daily  behavior  could  be  trans- 
formed from  a  triumph  of  bargaining  to  a  sacrament 
of  service. 

One  may  almost  say  that  the  practice  of  this  single 
virtue  must  include  a  whole  new  art  of  living.  On  the 
moral  side,  to  overcome  antipathies  of  temperament, 
—  on  the  mental,  to  maintain  intellectual  fellowship 
in  face  of  the  extreme  specialization  of  interests  seem- 
ingly impending, —  here  are  two  of  our  opportunities. 
One  foresees  grave  moral  perils.  We  shall  make  ship- 
wreck of  the  socialist  state  unless  we  learn  to  be  more 
steadily  generous  and  affectionate  toward  one  another : 
habitual  captiousness  would  upset  a  cooperative  civil- 
ization in  a  twinkling.  If  the  thought  sobers,  we  may 
reflect  that  when  the  nervous  strain  of  living  is  less- 
ened, we  shall  all  be  less  inclined  to  captiousness  than 
now.  The  difficulties,  on  the  other  hand,  will  be  never 
to  let  tolerance  slip  into  indifferentism,  and  to  main- 
tain uncompromising  standards  of  truth  and  conduct, 
while  identifying  one's  self  instinctively  with  myriad 

255 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

forms  of  thought  and  feeling.  The  adventure  of  the 
noble  life  will  certainly  be  harder  than  to-day;  but 
who  would  not  eagerly  undertake  it,  for  the  sake  of 
deepening  that  loyalty  to  the  whole  which  is  the  other 
definition  of  sympathy,  and  is,  as  we  already  know, 
the  goal  of  our  desires  ?  This  loyalty  will  bring  its 
own  disciplines,  for  it  will  force  us  to  condemn  all 
forms  of  self-indulgence,  gross  or  fine,  that  separate  us 
from  our  fellows ;  but  it  will  become  a  fruitful  source 
of  capacities  which  we  can  but  dimly  foresee. 

It  is  a  temptation  to  pause  a  moment  on  those  lesser 
morals  known  as  manners,  —  for  the  details  of  behav- 
ior are  simply  the  codified  expression  of  the  intuitions 
of  sympathy.  No  one  can  develop  these  when  he  is 
breathlessly  afraid  that  his  neighbor  is  going  to  tread 
on  his  toes,  —  and  we  need  not  wonder  if  modern 
manners  are  too  often  bad  when  frank,  and  false  when 
good.  With  humorous  difficulty,  an  individualistic  civ- 
ilization maintains  a  social  code.  In  etiquette,  we  still 
hold  the  theory  that  each  is  to  prefer  others  to  himself, 
whether  the  point  be  a  comfortable  chair  or  patience 
with  a  bore :  since  in  serious  affairs,  the  contrary  prin- 
ciple obtains,  the  notorious  degeneration  of  manners, 
especially  among  the  young,  is  a  tribute  to  our  honesty. 
The  industrial  revolution  is  our  only  hope ;  perhaps 
when  it  is  over  manners  may  regain  the  grace  and 
charm  of  the  pre-commercial  epoch.  Here,  too,  one 
craves  equality.  Refinement  has  always  been  mainly  a 
hot-house  growth,  and  it  would  be  a  great  thing  if  we 
could  plant  it  out  in  the  open.  Let  us  hope  that  the 

256 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

social  democracy  may  extend  gentle  breeding  beyond 
the  limits  of  class,  and  dower  the  shop-girl  or  the 
laborer  with  as  fine  a  mastery  of  the  art  of  living  as 
is  possessed  to-day  in  the  rare  circles  free  from  the 
black  magic  of  commercialism  and  the  necessity  of 
industrial  self-defense. 

Even  nowadays,  everybody  really  finds  humility  and 
brotherliness  more  attractive  than  energy  or  thrift. 
This  preference  is  a  little  hard  to  understand  since 
the  aggressive  virtues  have  so  far  possessed  so  much 
higher  social  value ;  but,  after  all,  these  are  an  over- 
flow from  the  productivity  of  nature  on  the  ordinary 
plane,  while  the  gentler  breathe  faint  airs  from  another 
country,  also  in  the  order  of  nature,  but  lying  on  a 
level  to  which  we  have  not  yet  ascended.  When  we 
get  there,  we  may  decide  to  our  surprise  that  the  ag- 
gressive and  self-seeking  virtues  have  comparatively 
slight  relation  to  the  higher  reaches  of  personality. 
Religion  has  always  surmised  this  to  be  the  case.  It 
has  insisted  paradoxically  that  the  centre  of  character 
is  a  focus  not  for  centripetal  but  for  centrifugal  forces, 
a  mere  point  whence  radiate  the  instincts  of  love  and 
service.  The  lover  is  the  only  man  who  truly  lives  ; 
and  the  lover,  like  the  poet  conceived  by  Keats,  has  no 
separate  existence :  he  is  "  forever  in  and  filling  some 
other  body."  In  both  manners  and  morals,  it  should 
prove  a  great  help  to  this  point  of  view,  though  a  queer 
reversal  of  our  present  standards,  to  have  the  lovable 
virtues  the  passport  to  success. 


257 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 


But  we  may  be  accused  of  mixing  socialism  up  with 
the  millennium.  And  that  would  be  a  silly  thing  to 
do,  not  only  because  it  is  not  going  to  be  the  millen- 
nium, but  also  because  a  great  many  people  would  lose 
all  interest  in  it  if  it  were.  So  it  may  be  well  for  us 
to  glance  at  the  dark  side  of  the  picture. 

The  new  world  will  be  inhabited  by  just  the  same 
sort  of  men  and  women  that  we  know  to-day,  and 
they  are  not  going  to  create  a  Fra  Angelico  paradise, 
—  pretty,  but  devoid  of  shadows.  On  the  contrary 
there  may  possibly  be  more  real  wickedness  in  the 
socialist  state  than  in  our  own.  A  civilized  man  can  be 
a  great  deal  viler  than  a  savage  when  he  sets  about  it, 
and  the  more  civilized  the  order,  the  worse  types  it 
may  produce.  The  very  fact  that  there  will  be  less  moral 
confusion  than  at  present  will  brush  away  many  an 
excuse  and  bring  out  into  the  open  plenty  of  evil  to 
do  away  with  monotony  and  give  spice  to  life  !  When 
certain  paradoxes  that  now  render  our  pursuit  of  virtue 
half-hearted  shall  have  vanished,  bad  impulses  will 
flourish  with  new  lustiness. 

Greed  and  self-seeking,  for  instance,  will  not  cease 
when  they  are  put  in  their  true  relation  to  the  social 
organism,  and  recognized  as  destructive  rather  than 
productive  powers.  At  first,  indeed,  they  may  be 
strengthened,  and  we  may  see  a  fine  crop  of  new  hypo- 
crisies, for  which  corporate  industry,  whether  managed 
through  government  or  through  voluntary  cooperation, 

258 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

will  afford  rich  opportunity.  The  bad  man  will  know 
himself  to  be  bad,  and  will  therefore  become  at  once 
more  insolent  and  more  secretive  than  to-day.  His 
dishonesty  will  seek  more  ingenious  evasions ;  in  pro- 
portion as  he  sins  against  light,  will  his  sin  react  on 
his  own  character  more  gravely.  As  the  modern  thug 
is  a  more  unlovely  person  than  that  gallant  lover  of 
the  poor  and  servant  of  ladies,  good  Robin  Hood,  so 
will  the  embezzler  of  the  future  be  more  unpleasant 
than  his  predatory  brother  of  to-day. 

New  perils,  new  emphases,  will  appear  on  every 
hand.  There  is  as  surely  a  root  of  evil  in  all  things 
good  as  a  root  of  good  in  all  things  evil.  For  instance, 
the  fate  of  purity  in  the  socialist  state  is  certainly  a 
grave  question.  Quite  conceivably,  it  may  have  a  des- 
perate struggle  to  maintain  even  the  nominal  respect 
now  accorded  it.  The  reaction  from  individualism  may 
here  work  out  curiously  complex  results.  Theories  of 
free  love,  in  spite  of  the  foolish  current  confusion  in 
the  socialist  ranks  and  outside  of  them,  have  obviously 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  economic  socialism ;  yet 
one  foresees  that  as  the  idea  of  the  sacredness  of  pri- 
vate property  dwindles,  one  inferior  and  adventitious 
support  to  the  monogamic  marriage,  which,  historically, 
rests  so  largely  on  this  idea,  may  be  withdrawn.  If 
purity,  as  the  Christian  world  understands  it,  is  to 
hold  its  own,  it  must  do  so  in  a  twofold  strength. 
First,  through  the  development  of  that  social  instinct 
which  shrinks  from  sinning  against  love,  and  then 
through  a  ready  submission  to  discipline  and  restraint 

259 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

which  should  be  instinctive  to  the  new  citizen  and 
help  him  in  every  department  of  life  to  a  temperate 
and  chaste  existence.  Love,  to  the  instinct  of  the 
natural  man,  is  an  indulgence ;  to  the  man  evolved 
and  spiritualized,  it  is  primarily  a  discipline,  the  fierc- 
est and  most  compelling  in  the  law  of  self-subordina- 
tion and  the  subjugation  of  desire  that  life  affords. 
When  the  social  instinct  shall  have  triumphed,  this 
truth  should  be  better  understood  than  it  has  ever 
been  understood  before,  and  should  work  mightily  to 
prevent  divorce.  Of  course,  also,  that  growth  in  com- 
prehension of  social  hygiene  and  of  eugenics,  which  is 
already  beginning,  will  help  to  overcome  the  cruder 
forms  of  the  sins  of  the  flesh. 

Sloth,  again,  may  threaten  for  a  time  to  be  wide- 
spread under  socialism.  Should  the  New  Order  come 
as  swiftly  as  some  indications  suggest,  —  let  us  say 
within  two  generations,  —  reaction  from  the  fearsome 
nervous  strain  of  our  own  day  may  well  breed  contagious 
indolence  for  a  season.  Probably  there  will  always  be 
inert  people  who  do  their  daily  stint  reluctantly,  evade 
it  as  far  as  they  can,  and  sink  back  in  their  free  time, 
—  shall  we  say  on  the  bridge  whist  of  the  future  ?  A 
leisure  class  would  be  no  new  phenomenon,  nor  could 
socialism  be  accused  of  having  brought  it  into  exist- 
ence. 

The  instincts  of  such  a  class  might  for  a  time  be  ex- 
tended over  a  wider  area  than  before.  Yet  it  is  hard 
to  think  otherwise  than  that  they  would  be  checked 
by  degrees.  For  our  modern  indolence  is  largely  the 

260 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

shadow  cast  by  the  general  economic  insecurity.  Men, 
like  horses,  balk  when  afraid,  and  Fear  is  lurking  among 
us.  When  hard  masters  speed  men  up,  moreover,  a 
sullen  "  soldiering "  policy  is  sure  to  result.  A  basis 
for  more  logical  prediction  is  found  in  the  conditions 
that  obtain  in  the  more  healthy  sections  of  our  pres- 
ent leisure  class,  and  when  one  notes  the  energy  that 
the  young  sons  of  privilege  put  to-day  into  football  and 
mountain-climbing,  one  is  inclined  to  give  up  worrying 
lest  energy  become  emasculated  in  the  socialist  state. 
We  must  not  forget  that  we  have  a  right  to  hope  in  a 
few  generations  for  a  more  vigorous  race,  less  depleted 
than  we  by  overwork  on  the  one  hand  and  surfeit  on 
the  other.  The  average  workman  will  no  longer  be  worn 
out  at  fifty,  and  the  gilded  youth  will  not  exist.  In  such 
a  race,  freed  from  the  exhausting  tyranny  of  economic 
fear,  endowed  with  tranquil  nerve  and  vigorous  mus- 
cle, it  seems  not  unreasonable  to  expect  that  the  great 
incentives  —  ambition,  pleasure  in  creation,  zest  of 
service  —  may  develop  the  primal  delight  in  activity 
strong  in  every  human  being  to  a  point  of  healthy  in- 
tensity never  seen  yet. 

But  predictions  pressed  too  far  are  folly,  for  unim- 
agined  factors  are  sure  to  appear  in  any  new  system  of 
social  relations.  We  must  not  rest  in  the  cheerful  point 
of  view,  nor  revert  too  confidently  to  the  hypothesis 
of  optimism.  The  future  is  veiled,  and  unsuspected 
elements  of  evil  as  well  as  of  good  are  surely  waiting 
among  its  secrets.  That  energy  can  ever  be  disentan- 
gled from  barter  without  a  resolute  struggle  is  hardly 

261 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

to  be  looked  for.  Yet  the  changing  order  seems  at  least 
to  promise  a  time  in  which  our  poor  tenacious  ideal 
of  spontaneity  in  lower  as  in  higher  services  need  no 
longer  be  stared  out  of  countenance  in  the  name  of 
prudence  and  self-respect. 

VI 

Thus  we  dare  to  dream  that  all  the  dear  virtues  of 
the  meadow-lands  will  flourish  in  the  good  days  to 
be:  — 

And  such  plenty  and  perfection  too  of  grass 
Never  was  — 

as  we  may  find  beneath  our  feet  in  that  sweet  climate. 
How  now  about  the  virtues  of  the  heights,  the  Coun- 
sels of  Perfection  ? 

We  cannot  forget  them,  we  cannot  achieve  them. 
How  renounce  the  world  when  consumed  with  steady 
terror  lest  it  renounce  us  and  we  be  left  jobless  ?  How 
obey  the  call  of  love  to  surrender  ourselves  wholly  to 
the  passion  of  giving  when  we  are  likely  to  render 
ourselves  social  parasites  and  nuisances  thereby  ?  Our 
noblest,  confronted  by  these  questions,  die  heart- 
broken, while  our  weaklings  lose  the  very  spring  of 
faith,  and  waste  in  sentiment  what  should  brace  them 
to  the  deed. 

But  a  change  is  coming.  Mercantile  and  commer- 
cial self-consciousness  will  fade  under  the  light  of  so- 
cialism, as  feudal  and  aristocratic  self-consciousness  is 
fading  under  the  light  of  democracy.  And  when  the 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

change  is  consummated  and  industrial  peace  shall  reign, 
sanctity  may  have  a  rebirth  such  as  our  unheroic  days 
can  never  hope  to  see. 

A  definite  and  inspiring  piece  of  work  waits  the 
leisure  of  better  days :  it  is  the  untried  study  of  the 
social  environment  most  favorable  to  the  production 
of  the  highest  types  of  character.  In  a  way,  to  discuss 
the  matter  now  is  guesswork;  yet  we  may  already 
venture  to  say  that  the  graces  of  unworldliness  and 
contemplation  have  rarely  flourished  either  in  extreme 
wealth  or  in  extreme  poverty.  The  great  lovers  of 
men,  the  lovers  of  Lady  Poverty,  the  lovers  of  the 
Unseen,  have  all  but  invariably  come  from  the  ranks 
of  the  reasonably  well-to-do.  Bernard  the  Blessed  was 
a  prosperous  Assisi  merchant,  Angelo  a  youth  of  noble 
birth.  Alone  among  the  first  Franciscans,  Elias  the 
traitor,  who  was  to  claim  all  luxuries  in  the  name  of 
his  sensitive  organism,  sprang  from  the  peasant  class. 
One  finds  corroboration  of  the  impression  in  running 
through  the  story  of  all  in  whom  religion  has  most 
nearly  realized  its  ideal.  The  highest  virtues  of  de- 
tachment, like  the  highest  qualities  of  genius,  have 
rarely  blossomed  from  the  soil  of  bitter  want  or  rank 
abundance ;  they  have  sprung  from  those  conditions 
of  reasonable  economic  security  which  already  obtain 
and  have  always  obtained  through  the  middle  strata 
of  society.  When  we  notice  that  these  are  the  condi- 
tions which  socialism  hopes  to  make  the  common  her- 
itage, have  we  not  the  right  to  hope  that  in  a  socialized 
-community  the  spiritual  life  may  mightily  thrive  ? 

263 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

If  our  thoughts  were  no  longer  centred  in  making 
a  living,  we  could  press  detachment  and  devotion  to 
any  point  we  like.  A  socialist  state  would  afford  con- 
ditions in  which  the  perpetual  conflict  in  temperament 
and  philosophy  between  the  schools  which  seek  per- 
fection through  fulfilling  the  flesh  and  those  which  seek 
perfection  through  scourging  it  could  be  fought  to  a 
finish.  Voluntary  asceticism  may  be  a  good  or  a  bad 
thing;  we  are  inclined  to  think  it  bad  to-day,  but 
we  shall  never  find  out  surely  until  it  has  free  scope. 
Under  socialism,  men  impelled  by  that  terror  of  ma- 
terial values  which  has  always  haunted  the  race  at  mo- 
ments even  in  the  most  cheerfully  efficient  phases  of 
Occidental  life,  and  which  dominates  the  East,  will 
have  their  chance.  Free  as  air  to  seek  reality  through 
the  repudiation  rather  than  the  pursuit  of  natural 
good,  they  can  live,  if  they  like,  austerely  as  any 
Guru,  for  the  sake  of  a  clearer  vision  of  the  unsubstan- 
tial Good.  And  the  puzzled  world  may  conceivably 
find  itself  in  a  position  at  last  to  choose  definitely  for 
the  first  time  between  their  ideal  and  the  other. 

Wise  Sir  Thomas  More,  seer  and  martyr,  foresaw 
the  prosperity  of  both  schools  in  his  socialist  state. 
Listen  to  the  account  of  religion  among  his  Utopians, 
where  the  "conspiracy  of  the  rich,"  as  he  serenely 
defines  contemporary  society,  has  been  defeated,  and 
"  every  man  has  a  right  to  everything,  for  among  them 
there  is  no  unequal  distribution,  so  that  no  man  is  in 
necessity,  and  though  no  man  has  anything,  yet  are 
they  all  rich." 

264 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

There  are  many  among  them  that  upon  a  motive  of  reli- 
gion neglect  learning,  nor  do  they  allow  themselves  any 
leisure  time,  but  are  perpetually  employed.  .  .  .  Some  of 
these  visit  the  sick :  others  mend  highways,  clean  ditches, 
repair  bridges,  or  dig  turf,  gravel,  or  stones.  .  .  .  Nor  do 
these  only  serve  the  public,  but  they  serve  even  private 
men ;  for  if  there  is  anywhere  a  rough,  hard  and  sordid 
piece  of  work  to  be  done,  from  which  many  are  frightened 
by  the  labor  and  loathsomeness  of  it,  if  not  the  despair  of 
accomplishing  it,  they  cheerfully  and  of  their  own  accord 
take  that  to  their  share.  .  .  . 

Of  these  there  are  two  sorts :  some  live  unmarried  and 
chaste  and  abstain  from  eating  any  sort  of  flesh ;  and  thus 
weaning  themselves  from  all  the  pleasures  of  the  present 
life,  which  they  account  hurtful,  they  pursue,  even  by  the 
hardest  and  painfullest  methods  possible,  that  blessedness 
which  they  hope  for  hereafter.  Another  sort  of  them  is  less 
willing  to  put  themselves  to  much  toil,  and  therefore  prefer 
a  married  state  to  a  single  one ;  —  nor  do  they  avoid  any 
pleasure  that  does  not  hinder  labor,  and  therefore  eat  flesh 
the  more  willingly,  as  they  find  that  by  this  means  they 
are  the  more  able  to  work.  The  Utopians  look  upon  these  as 
the  wiser  sect,  but  they  esteem  the  others  as  the  more  holy. 

Clever  people,  the  Utopians!  Well  aware  of  the 
endless  diversity  required  in  the  expression  of  the  re- 
ligious ideal!  We  can  see  at  once  how  simply  the 
lives  of  the  "more  holy"  sect,  if  more  holy  they  be, 
could  work  themselves  out  under  social  equality.  The 
adept  would  render  his  due  quota  of  service ;  and 
this  we  may  well  believe  that  no  Oriental  Guru  or 
mediaeval  friar  would  have  grudged,  had  he  lived  in 
that  New  Order,  from  which  the  idea  will  surely  have 

265 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

vanished  once  for  all  that  an  aptitude  for  ecstasy 
should  exonerate  a  man  from  work.  This  duty  once 
performed,  he  would  be  free  to  reject  his  share  of 
the  perquisites  and  pleasures  to  be  so  evenly  offered, 
preferring  a  lodging  under  the  stars,  and  the  mere 
bread  and  water  required  by  Brother  Body.  In  such 
a  world  Francis  would  not  die  broken-hearted  nor 
Ruskin  insane,  nor  need  Tolstoy  pass  away  in  pathetic 
endeavor  to  bear  full  witness  at  the  last  to  that  love 
universal  from  which  love  particular  had  all  his  life 
withheld  him.  Saints  might  spend  their  time,  accord- 
ing to  their  mystic  will,  in  contemplation  or  ministra- 
tion, singing  in  clear  tones  the  Lauds  of  Poverty. 

Those  who  have  possessed  all  created  things  in 
despising  them  have  always  spoken  of  their  state  as  a 
third  heaven.  Into  this  heaven  only  the  few  will  ever 
seek  to  enter;  but  at  least  under  socialism  the  way 
thither  will  no  longer  be  barred  by  social  compunction 
or  the  dread  of  shirking  one's  responsibility  for  push- 
ing the  world  along. 

VII 

We  are  ready  for  our  climax ;  for  answer  to  that 
obstinate  question  whether,  in  any  reasonably  conceiv- 
able social  order,  perfect  obedience  to  the  precepts  of 
Jesus  could  be  practiced  without  social  waste. 

Among  the  most  authentic  sayings  by  the  Master 
there  are  many  beside  the  Beatitudes  which  practical 
men  have  always  dismissed  with  a  smile.  Not  to  take 
thought  for  the  morrow,  never  to  worry  about  being 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

clothed  and  fed,  were  commands  indorsed  by  what 
seems  a  peculiarly  unworldly  appeal  to  the  life  of  the 
lily  of  the  field  and  the  bird  of  the  air ;  and  we  can 
hardly  wonder  if  the  parallel  has  always  been  scouted 
as  a  pretty  fantasy.  Yet  Jesus,  even  when  most  po- 
etic, is  never  sentimental.  If  he  presented  the  life 
of  birds  and  flowers  as  the  true  model  for  human 
existence,  it  is  because  he  actually  believed  that  their 
freedom  from  anxious  self-consciousness  and  their 
peaceful  fulfillment  of  function  were  conditions  that 
ought  to  be  reproduced  in  economic  relations.  And 
it  is  worth  noting  that  some  people  have  always  been 
found  to  agree  with  him,  and  to  believe  that  we  should 
never  rest  till  what  we  may  call  the  "field-flower" 
ideal  in  sociology  should  really  be  achieved. 

How  can  we  fail,  indeed,  to  watch  with  wistful  envy 
the  charming  ways  of  birds  and  blossoms,  —  concerned 
with  no  anxious  balancings  in  the  struggle  for  self-sup- 
port ?  How  can  we  fail  to  long  that  human  relations 
might  be  put  on  a  basis  as  healthfully  instinctive  as  the 
interchange  of  energy  in  the  life  of  nature?  No  bother- 
ing about  preliminary  contracts  here,  —  for  so  much  cal- 
oric received,  so  much  perfume  due  when  the  note  of  the 
season  matures ;  for  so  much  wage  in  hydrogen,  so 
much  work  in  pushing  force!  The  plant  draws  its 
juices  from  the  earth  and  blossoms  at  the  touch  of 
distant  sun  in  ever-renewed  miracle  of  dainty  exacti- 
tude, shapes  into  ever  new  modes  the  atoms  of  energy 
so  freely  bestowed  on  it  by  Natura  Benigna,  and  when 
its  service  is  rendered  droops  peacefully  to  earth  at 

267 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  appointed  hour,  bequeathing  its  life  to  seasons  yet 
to  be.  Shall  human  existence  always  present  a  spec- 
tacle of  false  waste  and  futile  conflict,  compared  with 
that  of  the  flower? 

To  reproduce  the  laws  of  nature  in  human  society 
has  been  a  dream  never  abandoned  by  the  Christian 
consciousness.  Further  than  that,  the  wider  and  non- 
religious  thought  of  the  world  reverts  to  it  with  star- 
tling constancy.  The  poet  sighs  after  it,  the  philosophic 
anarchist  pleads  for  it,  and  schools  of  thought  reap- 
pearing in  every  century  present  it  as  the  sum  of  wisdom. 
When  civilization  has  become  most  complex,  the  de- 
sire to  escape  and  to  share  in  those  lovely  harmonies 
where  man  is  not  has  become  keenest :  ever  since  the 
time  of  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau  and  his  followers  the 
ideal  has  been  vividly  before  men's  eyes.  Rousseau 
and  his  kin  would  have  been  surprised  indeed  to  be 
accused  of  Christianity ;  yet  the  source  and  archetype 
of  the  whole  movement  which  we  sum  up  in  the  form- 
ula, the  "  return  to  nature,"  is  to  be  found  in  the  Ser- 
mon on  the  Mount. 

The  ideal  has  had  a  bitter  struggle,  however,  to 
maintain  itself  against  the  realities  of  economic 
life.  And  we  may  wonder  what  mysterious  purpose 
turned  it,  as  first  expressed  in  the  Gospel,  rather  to 
the  West  than  to  the  East.  For  that  Gospel,  born 
at  the  meeting-point  of  East  and  West,  might,  ifc 
would  seem,  have  moved  more  naturally  eastward  than 
westward.  In  the  Orient,  the  ideas  of  Jesus  might 
have  won  a  facile  and  immediate  victory ;  for  there 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

was  much  in  them  to  harmonize  with  the  intuitions 
and  experience  of  the  Oriental  tradition.  Yet  the  as- 
sent accorded  them  would  doubtless  have  ended  at 
last  in  the  Great  Refusal,  and  a  new  emphasis  on  the 
joys  of  Nirvana.  In  the  Occident,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  ideal  had  to  achieve  its  triumph,  if  at  all,  in  the  life 
practical,  not  in  the  life  contemplative.  For  as  we  have 
already  noted,  among  the  Romans  of  the  Empire  and 
the  vigorous  Northern  races  who  succeeded  them,  any 
help  which  religion  might  offer  existence  had  to  be  ful- 
filled in  normal  activities,  and  to  manifest  itself,  not  by 
repudiation, but  by  sanctification  of  natural  life.  Under 
European  conditions,  religion  would  count  for  nothing 
in  the  long  run  unless  it  could  make  itself  at  home  in 
the  world  of  men. 

We  know  how  valiantly  it  tried,  how  sorrowfully  it 
failed !  how  it  met  a  partial  but  solid  success  as  soon 
as  it  lapsed  into  Orientalism,  as  in  the  monastic  move- 
ment ;  how  it  was  routed  worse  and  worse  when  it  fol- 
lowed the  Master's  method,  and  tried  to  penetrate  the 
natural  order.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  with  their  com- 
parative social  stability,  the  ideal  of  taking  no  thought 
for  the  morrow  was  to  a  certain  extent  implicit,  and 
awaited  only  such  touch  of  romantic  spiritual  passion 
as  Francis  gave,  to  blossom  in  brief  fragrant  beauty. 
Yet  feudalism  was  at  heart  as  inimical  to  such  instincts 
as  any  other  civilization  founded  on  inequality  must  be ; 
and  the  partial  success  of  the  ideal,  then  as  later,  was 
the  signal  for  its  doom. 

Where  shall  we  look  to-day  for  its  effective  presence  ? 
269 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

In  the  leisure  class  we  find,  to  be  sure,  especially 
among  women,  some  very  flower-like  persons,  who  take 
no  thought  for  the  morrow,  and  spend  their  lives  among 
fine  emotions  and  religious  dreams.  But  such  graceful 
triumphs  leave  the  spirit  restive.  The  lilies  we  were 
bidden  consider  were  field-flowers,  not  greenhouse  ex- 
otics, and  one  has  only  to  follow  in  imagination  the 
labors  which  sustain  these  gentle  parasites,  to  reject 
the  thought  that  their  spirituality  is  an  asset  to  the 
race.  Meantime,  in  the  serious  business  of  modern 
life,  Carlyle's  great  Goddess  of  Getting  On  presides 
nervously  over  an  uncomfortable  world. 

Yet  that  old  desire  for  harmony,  simplicity,  and 
peace  continues  obstinately  to  haunt  the  mind.  And 
since  it  is  now  pretty  well  proved  that  we  can  never 
rightly  return  to  nature  by  running  away  from  civiliz- 
ation, we  begin  to  ask  whether  it  be  not  possible  to  in- 
clude civilization  itself  in  the  natural  order. 

Time  was,  to  be  sure,  when  the  model  always 
dimly  discerned  in  that  order  seemed  to  indorse  all 
the  horrors  of  the  competitive  system.  "Red  in  tooth 
and  claw  with  ravine,"  Nature  shrieked  against  the 
creed  of  progress  through  fellowship ;  and  the  en- 
couragement of  the  weak  to  perish  seemed  the  only 
principle  she  countenanced.  We  hear  little  of  such 
talk  to-day,  for  we  are  penetrating  deeper  into  her 
secrets.  In  the  perpetual  systole  and  disastole  of  crea- 
tion and  destruction  creation  wins  out  on  the  whole. 
The  endless  evolution  of  form  and  life,  through 
chaos  and  inertia,  is  the  reality  to  which  decay  is  but 

270 


THE  ETHICS  OF  EQUALITY 

incidental.  This  evolution  proceeds,  indeed,  partly 
through  sacrifice,  —  since  dying,  rightly  construed,  is 
an  episode  in  living,  —  but  mainly  through  attraction, 
propagation,  increase.  It  is  for  us  to  imitate  the  life 
of  Nature,  not  her  death,  and  that  life  is  fulfilled  not 
in  antagonisms  but  in  reciprocity  of  ordered  service. 
"From  harmony,  from  heavenly  harmony  this  uni- 
versal frame  began  "  ;  and  despite  all  appearances  to 
the  contrary,  science  and  philosophy  bring  us  ever 
new  confidence  that  the  diapason  shall  yet  close  full 
in  man. 

We  find  ourselves,  through  no  will  of  our  own,  in 
a  material  universe  where  the  productive  and  sustain- 
ing activities  depend  on  the  exquisite  adjustment  of 
natural  forces,  toward  which  our  main  responsibility 
is  so  to  use  them  that  they  be  not  disturbed.  Accord- 
ing to  the  socialist  philosophy,  the  task  laid  on  us  is 
to  create  for  ourselves  an  economic  universe  to  corre- 
spond, through  which  the  same  laws  may  be  extended, 
till  the  interchange  of  services  becomes  spontaneous 
and  unconscious  as  the  intake  and  outgo  of  the  breath 
and  the  rise  and  fall  of  tides.  In  this  state  the  per- 
formance of  necessary  functions  would  be  subject  to 
no  such  dislocations  as  now  rack  our  social  being,  and 
no  such  waste  of  power  as  now  appalls  us.  They 
would  proceed  with  the  inevitable  and  august  simplic- 
ity which  marks  the  energies  of  the  bodily  organism, 
or  the  circling  of  the  never-resting  stars.  Civiliza- 
tion would  have  found  its  "  cure,"  not  by  suicide,  as 
in  the  desperate  proposals  of  anarchists  whether  mys- 

271 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

tical  or  practical,  but  by  growth  into  a  maturity  which 
should  conform  at  last  to  the  large  harmonies  of  the 
physical  order,  and  cause  the  uniformity  of  law  to  be 
more  than  a  convenient  phrase. 

In  such  a  civilization,  parallels  drawn  from  the  life 
of  flower  and  bird  would  lose  their  apparent  absurdity ; 
the  true  "  return  to  nature  "  would  be  realized  at  last, 
and  the  ideal  of  Jesus  could  be  translated,  just  so  far 
as  men  desired,  into  sober  fact.  Then  it  would  be  our 
happy  privilege  to  understand  the  poets  when  they 
sing  of  a  heaven  "  where  law,  life,  joy,  impulse  are 
one  thing."  We  could  take  our  place  among  those 
"glad  souls  without  reproach  or  blot"  who  do  the 
work  of  Justice,  not  knowing  what  they  do.  For  the 
Power  which  preserves  the  stars  from  wrong,  and 
through  which  the  most  ancient  heavens  are  fresh 
and  strong,  would  at  last  have  become  the  control- 
ling principle  within  the  body  politic,  as  within  the 
individual  heart. 

So  the  vision  of  socialism  proves  to  be  the  ancient 
vision  to  which  faith  has  clung  throughout  the  ages. 
It  is  the  fulfillment,  not  the  contradiction,  of  the 
demand  which  Religion  has  most  steadily  proffered 
through  all  baffling  discouragement  even  in  the  house 
of  her  friends. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE   CHOICE  :   AND   AFTER 


WE  have  worked  our  way  through  all  the  zones 
where  distrust  of  socialism  prevails,  and  have  pushed 
to  the  centre.  There  we  have  found  full  confirmation 
of  our  early  hope  that  the  distrust  may  be  rejected. 
Religion  has  defended  a  spiritual  ideal  throughout  the 
ages  against  desperate  odds.  To-day,  at  the  precise 
juncture  where  her  battle  might  seem  hopelessly  lost, 
help  comes  from  a  new  quarter ;  and  religious  minds 
honestly  scanning  the  situation  may  well  discern  the 
most  powerful  of  allies  in  the  socialism  which  has  been 
feared  as  the  most  dangerous  of  their  foes. 

If  we  are  ever  to  be  in  a  position  to  realize  the  full 
aspirations  of  the  saints  without  involving  society  in 
suicide,  it  is  the  cooperative  commonwealth  that  will 
give  us  the  chance.  Down  the  ages,  the  captive  people 
of  God  raise  their  Advent  plea  for  rescue,  — "  Oh, 
come,  oh,  come,  Emmanuel !  "  —  and  down  the  ages 
they  deny  Emmanuel  when  He  answers  their  summons. 
Will  the  blunder  be  repeated  ?  Or  will  the  stronger 
spirits  of  our  generation  gain  insight  to  welcome  the 
New  Order  toward  which  the  Mind  revealed  in  eco- 
nomic history  seems  clearly  pointing  the  way? 

Our  pilgrim  may  no  longer  stand  hesitant  at  the 
273 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

parting  of  the  roads.  The  hour  for  his  choice  has  come. 
And  as  usual  at  such  crises,  he  finds  this  choice  already 
made  for  him,  —  be  it  by  the  unconscious  self  within, 
or  by  the  God  above.  He  cannot  say  complacently, 
with  the  arrogance  of  over-responsible  and  dogmatic 
youth,  "  Having  thoroughly  weighed  arguments  and 
sifted  objections,  I  do  herewith  embrace  the  socialist 
creed "  ;  rather,  it  may  be  in  the  solitudes  of  some 
white  night,  it  may  be  in  a  great  assembly  where  angry 
opinions  clash  and  passions  are  tossing  hearts  like 
spray,  he  will  become  amazedly  aware  of  a  new  inun- 
dating certitude  ;  and  "  with  that  stoop  of  the  soul 
which  in  bending  upraises  it  too,"  will  discover  that, 
apart  from  his  ken  or  his  volition,  socialist  faith  has 
taken  possession  of  him.  Life  can  never  be  the  same 
again.  It  is  experiences  like  these,  in  which  the  spirit 
dies  to  live,  that  re-create  personality  and  transform 
civilization.  Opinions  may  fade  like  a  spring  breeze, 
convictions  even  may  sweep  tempestuously  over  the 
soul,  and  subside  at  their  appointed  hour  ;  but  these 
"  real  assents,"  so  vividly  described  by  John  Henry 
Newman,  can  never  alter.  They  are  knit  into  the  sub- 
stance of  the  soul  and  "  form  the  mind  out  of  which 
they  grow." 

Till  we  have  them',  in  spite  of  a  full  apprehension  and 
assent  in  the  field  of  notions,  we  have  no  intellectual  moor- 
ings, and  are  at  the  mercy  of  wandering  lights,  whether  as 
regards  personal  conduct,  social  and  political  action,  or 
religion.  .  .  .  They  create,  as  the  case  may  be,  heroes  and 
saints,  great  leaders,  statesmen,  preachers  and  reformers, 

274 


THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

the  pioneers  of  discovery  in  science,  visionaries,  fanatics, 
knights-errant,  demagogues,  and  adventurers.  They  have 
given  to  the  world  .  .  .  men  of  immense  energy,  of  adaman- 
tine will,  of  revolutionary  power.  They  kindle  sympathies 
between  man  and  man,  and  knit  together  the  innumerable 
units  which  constitute  a  race  or  nation.  They  become  the 
principle  of  its  political  existence :  they  impart  to  it  homo- 
geneity of  thought  and  fellowship  of  purpose.1 

Socialism  is  inspiring  these  "  real  assents  "  on  every 
hand.  Silently,  secretly,  among  all  temperaments  and 
traditions,  it  is  claiming  its  own ;  and  the  fact  is  the 
best  warrant  for  its  future  power. 

So  our  pilgrim,  with  the  Advent  anthem,  it  may  be, 
on  his  lips,  faces  the  open  country  and  sets  his  feet  with 
solemn  cheer  on  the  path  to  the  untraveled  socialist 
heights,  —  confident  that  they  are  no  dissolving  cloud- 
land  but  'the  appointed  future  home  of  happy  genera- 
tions, and  that  the  race  must  advance  straight  toward 
them  would  it  pursue  aright  its  journey 

On,  to  the  bounds  of  the  waste, 
On,  to  the  city  of  God. 

He  is  a  socialist  now,  not  with  the  eager  surface  en- 
thusiasm of  first  allegiance,  but  with  the  sober  con- 
viction of  a  mind  that  "  has  kept  watch  o'er  man's 
mortality,"  has  tested,  weighed,  and  won. 

Adding  a  final  act  of  will  to  the  long  process  of  his 
conversion,  he  proceeds  from  faith  to  action,  sets  him- 
self to  inhabit  Time  and  Eternity  at  once,  and  finds 
the  feat  not  impossible.  For  assurance  has  come  to 
1  A  Grammar  of  Assent. 
275 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

him  that  only  in  the  frank  acceptance  of  the  material 
and  evolving  can  a  revelation  of  the  spiritual  and 
eternal  be  attained.  He  is  too  well  aware  that  history 
always  holds  surprises  in  reserve  to  expect  that  the  civil- 
ization of  the  future  will  assume  the  exact  cast  which 
his  theories  predict ;  but  in  his  resolve  to  rehabilitate 
the  natural  order  and  to  establish  social  equality,  he 
believes  that  he  follows  the  call  of  the  Spirit  no  less 
than  the  desire  of  the  healthy  sense.  Hazard  waits  on 
the  steps  of  all  who  leave  well-trodden  paths  to  blaze 
a  trail  toward  far  and  unexplored  regions.  Socialism 
is  adventure,  not  achievement ;  but  it  is  surely  the 
noblest  adventure,  and  undertaken  hi  the  surest  expec- 
tation of  attaining  a  righteous  goal,  of  any  quest  that 
has  summoned  the  human  spirit  since  history  began. 

II 

From  the  citadel  of  his  security,  the  socialist  con- 
vert listens  with  more  amusement  than  chagrin  to  the 
assaults  on  his  creed  from  various  quarters.  Now  that 
he  has  exorcised  fear  lest  the  historic  antagonism  be- 
tween socialism  and  religion  be  rooted  in  permanent 
truth,  neither  political  oppositions  nor  ethical  criti- 
cisms distress  him.  Accusing  voices  cry,  on  the  one 
hand,  that  socialism  rests  on  the  fatal  delusion  that  hu- 
manity may  be  re-created  by  external  means,  —  assert 
on  the  other  that  the  New  Order  demands  an  im- 
possible change  in  human  nature.  His  faith  is  attacked, 
now  as  a  product  of  scientific  materialism,  now  as  Utopian 
sentimentality.  Some  foresee  in  it  a  lax  state  of  self- 

276 


THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

indulgent  ease,  others  an  intolerable  despotism.  These 
accusations  cannot  all  be  true ;  and  socialists,  blown  on 
from  directions  so  diverse,  find  it  pertinent  to  remem- 
ber that  a  system  which  incurs  contradictory  criticisms 
at  the  same  moment,  probably  has  its  source  in  that 
region  below  logic  where  all  contradictions  are  united. 
This  is  the  region  whence  living  forces  proceed;  and 
that  socialism  is  a  living  force  rather  than  a  doctri- 
naire theory  could  not  be  better  demonstrated  than  by 
the  opposing  animosities  it  awakes.  These  animosities 
are  to  be  sure  the  central  intellectual  tragedy  of  our 
day ;  but  instead  of  disheartening  us,  they  may  neutral- 
alize  each  other,  and  nerve  us  to  the  effort  at  dispel- 
ling the  misconceptions  on  which  they  rest.  Such  effort 
is  the  chief  opportunity  of  the  modern  thinker,  states- 
man, revolutionist,  or  man  of  prayer. 

In  like  manner  the  dissensions  encountered  within  the 
socialist  movement  become  welcome  tokens  of  its  vigor. 
Numerous  and  virulent,  these  dissensions  !  A  man  may 
give  patronizing  academic  allegiance  to  socialist  theory, 
and  abide  in  peace ;  if  he  identifies  himself  with  social- 
ist action,  it  behooves  him  to  be  firm  of  soul.  For  in 
this  vast  movement  which  has  left  the  closet  of  the  phi- 
losopher for  the  open  field  of  politics  there  is  as  much 
tumult  and  clash  as  in  a  racing  tide.  One  need  only 
look  over  the  collection l  of  documents  edited  by 
R.  C.  K.  Ensor,  to  see  the  varied  reactions  of  social- 
ism on  a  picked  lot  of  brilliant  minds.  The  records  of 
socialist  congresses  display  the  refreshing  vehemence 
1  Modern  Socialism. 
277 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

with  which  people  divided  by  tenuous  distinctions  can 
sling  language  at  each  other.  The  issues  are  practical 
and  vital.  How  far  shall  patriotism  be  recognized  ?  May 
peasant  proprietorship  be  indorsed?  How  about  op- 
portunist policy  ?  Shall  some  social  reforms  be  encour- 
aged, or  must  all  alike  be  repudiated  as  flank  move- 
ments on  the  part  of  privilege  ?  To  what  extent  will 
private  ownership  be  tolerated  in  the  socialized  com- 
munity? Questions  are  theoretical  to-day,  practical  to- 
morrow ;  to  follow  socialist  propaganda  is  to  realize  the 
amazing  rapidity  with  which  they  pass  from  the  field 
of  speculation  on  to  that  of  debatable  issues,  and  the 
passionate  acrimony  of  the  discussions  they  educe.  In- 
deed, the  lusty  bitterness  of  socialist  factions  is  a  pop- 
ular scandal  and  cause  of  many  a  pleasant  scoff  at  the 
implications  of  the  name. 

Socialism  in  truth  has  as  many  sects  as  Christianity, 
each  abusing  the  other,  as  usual,  in  direct  proportion 
to  the  closeness  of  their  resemblance.  Nor  is  a  uniform 
socialist  theory  any  more  likely  to  emerge  than  a  uni- 
form.Christianity  emerged  from  the  quarrels  of  the  early 
Church.  The  Marxians  frequently  remind  one  of  their 
master's  description  of  Lord  Palmerston,  for  they  well 
"  know  how  to  conciliate  a  democratic  phraseology  with 
oligarchic  views "  and  methods.  But  in  vain  do  they 
try  to  impose  as  rigid  a  uniformity  on  the  party  as  the 
Curia  is  just  now  pressing,  on  its  unlucky  priests,  and 
show  like  alacrity  in  scenting  heresies.  Differences 
intensify  as  the  movement  grows  strong.  Theories 
cherished  in  one  decade  are  scouted  in  another.  For 

278 


THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

instance,  a  tendency  can  be  discerned,  even  among 
Marxians,  to  evade  the  theory  of  surplus  value.  Nor 
for  that  matter  was  the  master  always  consistent  with 
himself.  Jaures  has  cleverly  pointed  out  the  simplicity 
with  which  Marx  at  times  contradicted  and  even  dis- 
avowed his  own  pet  theory  of  the  widening  gulf  be- 
tween proletariat  and  bourgeoisie. 

If  we  look  beyond  the  more  solidified  and  coherent 
phases  of  the  political  movement,  to  the  nebulous  mat- 
ter that  after  all  affords  part  of  its  illumination  as  it 
sweeps  onward  through  space,  the  divergences  increase. 
They  centre  of  course  around  our  old  issue.  Some  men 
are  socialists  because  they  believe  the  race  to  be  grow- 
ing so  altruistic  that  people  will  by  degrees  volunta- 
rily abjure  privilege ;  others  because  they  believe  it  to 
be  developing  so  swiftly  in  enlightened  selfishness  that 
the  dispossessed  will  soon  be  able  to  claim  their  own. 
The  first  group  desire  to  see  the  end  achieved  by  the 
appeal  to  moral  idealism  alone ;  the  other  depends  with 
equal  confidence  on  the  rising  pressure  of  class-interests. 
So  marked  is  the  growth  of  this  second  group,  to  be 
sure,  that  the  idealist  is  forced  in  self-defense  to  trans- 
plant his  optimism  into  the  soil  of  economic  reality; 
yet  socialism  lends  itself  with  entire  ease  to  the  theo- 
ries of  either  school.  No  sensible  man  would  deny  the 
title  of  socialist  to  thinkers  like  Lowes  Dickinson  or 
Walter  Eauschenbusch ;  yet  these,  and  many  others 
who  stand  to  lose  that  the  cause  may  win,  hold  the 
doctrines  of  economic  determinism  and  class-struggle 
in  horror.  This  book  accepts  these  doctrines;  but 
1  279 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHAEACTER 

the  construction  here  put  on  them  will  be  foolishness 
and  irritation  to  many  a  good  Marxian  into  whose 
hands  it  may  happen  to  fall.  Whether  in  matters  of 
tactics,  of  programs,  or  of  ideals,  the  bitter  conten- 
tions among  socialists  give  color  to  the  common  view  so 
complacently  reiterated,  that  socialism  means  anything 
or  nothing,  and  that  the  public  may  defer  consideration 
of  it  till  its  exponents  are  agreed  among  themselves. 

Yet  in  all  the  shifting  play  of  opinion  and  speculation, 
the  central  socialist  principle,  the  necessity  to  social 
welfare  that  a  large  proportion  at  least  of  wealth-pro- 
ducing wealth  be  socially  owned,  stands  solid  as  a 
rock.  As  time  goes  on,  as  the  idea  escapes  from  mere 
deductive  idealism  and  relates  itself  more  and  more 
intimately  to  the  realities  of  economic  evolution,  its 
solidity  becomes  increasingly  apparent.  And  all  this 
circling  of  thought  around  the  central  point,  these  free 
and  contradictory  energies  of  contradictory  assertions, 
—  what  are  they  but  index  and  proof  of  the  vitality 
of  the  whole  conception  ?  The  intensity  of  inconsistent 
emotions  is  a  sign  of  immaturity,  but  it  is  a  sign  of 
growth.  Socialism  to  its  adherents  is  not  merely  theory 
but  faith,  and  the  doom  of  faith  is  upon  it :  faith,  which 
does  not  wing  its  flight  afar  in  distant  skies,  but  is 
ever  tossed  about  like  a  little  ship  on  the  stormy  sea 
of  what  Newman  calls  "  the  wild,  fierce,  restless  intel- 
lect of  man."  If  we  have  here  no  small  wizened  man- 
made  theory  but  a  faith  of  God's  ordaining,  all  history 
goes  to  show  that  the  slow  process  of  its  victory  must 
be  exactly  what  we  witness  in  our  generation. 


THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

A  movement  finds  itself  as  it  matures,  and  we  may 
look  for  increasing  liberality  and  coherence  within  the 
socialist  ranks.  At  the  same  time  we  may  be  assured 
that  so  long  as  the  movement  thrives,  new  differences 
will  arise  as  the  old  are  settled.  What  we'  are  engaged 
in  is  no  less  than  the  conscious  evolution  of  a  new 
world,  and  the  process  will  involve  more  and  larger 
conflicting  issues  than  men  have  ever  had  to  settle 
before.  This  process  will  have  a  value,  in  the  educa- 
tion and  stimulus  of  the  common  will  and  mind,  greater 
than  we  can  possibly  imagine.  Meanwhile,  we  may  be 
fairly  certain  that  the  two  chief  ways  of  interpreting 
socialism,  Utopian  and  idealist  on  the  one  hand,  ma- 
terialistic and  fatalist  on  the  other,  will  be  as  conspic- 
uous when  the  time  has  come  for  retrospect  as  they 
now  are  in  forecast.  The  future  historians  to  whom 
falls  the  inspiriting  task  of  recounting  the  great  change 
will  constitute  two  opposing  schools:  "Note,"  say  the 
more  severe,  "how  impersonal  and  inevitable  were 
those  august  economic  forces  which  in  the  fullness  of 
time  necessitated  revolution,  and  by  a  process  sure  as 
the  circling  of  the  earth,  transformed  the  irrational 
capitalistic  civilization  of  the  nineteenth  century  into 
the  better-organized  industrial  democracy  in  which  our 
lot  is  cast ;  and  admire  the  majesty  of  natural  law, 
unaffected  by  the  petty  whims  or  plans  of  men  "  ;  — 
"  Nay !  It  was  the  free  will  of  man  and  his  spiritual 
passion  that  wrought  the  whole  change  ! "  retort  the 
Carlyles  and  Greens  of  the  future :  "  See  in  the  liter- 
ature of  the  times  of  transition  how  rich  and  poor  alike 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

chafed  restlessly  under  their  bondage.  Watch  the  birth 
and  growth  of  the  pure  impulse  of  brotherhood,  fal- 
tering and  visionary  at  first,  increasingly  practical  and 
efficient  as  it  advances,  till  it  dares  greatly,  and  com- 
mits democracy  to  the  last  venture  of  faith.  See  the 
social  compunction  of  the  privileged  hastening  to  meet 
more  than  halfway  the  developing  intelligence  of  the 
unprivileged,  till  men  enter  into  pact  with  a  divine  reck- 
lessness to  retrieve  the  crimes  and  absurdities  of  the 
past,  and  to  establish  the  reign  of  Fellowship,  through 
the  cooperative  commonwealth."  $ 

So  will  each  school  bend  itself,  according  to  its  lights, 
to  the  stirring  narrative  of  the  great  process.  The 
theme  will  be  the  same,  the  tales  will  differ  in  empha- 
sis and  interpretation.  Yet  both  will  be  true,  and 
neither  true  without  the  other. 

m 

In  that  double  interpretation  which  socialism  invites, 
religious  and  liberal  socialists  must  find  their  strength, 
their  peace,  and  their  incentive.  They  will  welcome 
their  creed  as  a  partial  but  real  fulfillment  of  the  hopes 
of  the  world's  dreamers ;  they  will  see  in  it  also  the 
scientific  summary  of  a  process  with  which  dreamers 
or  idealists  have  had  singularly  little  to  do,  except  as 
they  have  learned  to  identify  themselves  with  the  will 
of  that  Great  Idealist  who  both  hides  and  reveals 
Himself  behind  the  veil  of  natural  law.  So  they  will 
arise  and  play  their  parts  like  men  ;  for  at  this  point 
we  must  reassert  once  more  the  responsibility  of  the 


THE  CHOICE:  AND  AFTER 

individual,  —  of  you,  and  you,  and  me.  The  'sense  of 
personal  duty  clinches  the  conviction  of  the  religious 
socialist.  He  still  appreciates  intensely  the  cogency 
of  the  doubts  that  torment  the  critic.  None  feels  so 
vividly  that  socialism  might  and  may  be  a  moral  dis- 
aster, — a  triumph  of  false  legalism,  denying  the  soul, 
and  establishing  itself  in  the  arrogant,  and  dangerous 
power  of  the  flesh.  But  should  so  melancholy  a  consum- 
mation occur,  religion  will  have  only  itself  to  blame; 
for  it  has  opportunity  to  infuse  its  own  dynamic  into 
the  new  order  so  evidently  on  the  way,  and  to  make 
socialism  an  expression  of  its  own  soul. 

The  citizen  whom  the  socialized  community  will  most 
deeply  need  is  the  man  so  alive  to  the  values  of  the 
Spirit  that  he  would  accept  no  escape  from  social  ills, 
however  alluring,  did  he  not  see  in  it  the  best  promise 
for  the  future  of  character.  It  is  this  man,  when  after 
heart-searching  inquiry,  he  finally  dedicates  himself 
loyally  and  with  religious  consecration  to  the  socialist 
ideal,  who  can  both  prepare  the  way  rightly  for  the 
cooperative  commonwealth,  and  rightly  maintain  it. 
Socialism,  like  all  saviors  of  the  race,  may  come  either 
to  condemn  or  to  bless,  to  judge  or  to  redeem.  What 
aspect  its  advent  shall  bear  is  for  us  to  determine ; 
for  the  type  which  the  inevitable  social  changes  of  the 
future  will  assume  depends  fundamentally  on  the  sort 
of  people  who  decide  to  further  those  changes,  and  on 
their  attitude  and  work  during  the  period  of  transition. 


CHAPTER   V 

RECOVERIES 


TIME  was  when  our  flight  into  the  future  might 
have  been  judged  of  the  Icarus  variety,  borne  by  wings 
sure  to  melt  as  they  soared.  But  we  are  less  scornful 
of  flying  than  we  were.  Long  was  the  way  from  Icarus 
to  Leonardo  da  Vinci,  who  schemed  and  dreamed  wings 
for  men  through  his  whole  thwarted  life ;  long  also 
from  Leonardo  to  the  triumphant  aeroplane.  Icarus 
was  a  sentimentalist  if  you  will,  —  but  in  the  marvel- 
ous Renascence  brain  of  Leonardo  the  science  of  the 
future  was  teeming.  That  science  had  to  wait  its  hour ; 
now  that  the  times  are  fulfilled,  dreamers  may  set  them- 
selves with  fresh  courage  to  fashioning  on  scientific 
principles  wings  that  shall  carry  them  toward  the  good 
land  To-Be. 

We  socialists  feel  ourselves  borne  through  the  sky 
serenely  and  securely  by  the  white  wings  of  vision  and 
purpose.  As  we  look  off,  the  luminous  prospect  of 
present  and  future  is  spread  before  us,  revealed  in  true 
relations  and  proportions.  And  not  least  of  our  joys 
is  the  discovery  of  the  real  value  in  much  that  we  had 
left  behind.  We  had  turned  in  sorrow  and  perhaps 
impatience  from  the  enthusiasms  of  our  youth  and  the 
convictions  of  the  elder  generation.  But  "there  shall 

284 


RECOVERIES 


never  be  one  lost  good,"  and  all  we  had  once  cherished 
awaits  us  at  a  further  stage  of  our  journey. 

Iconoclasm  has  its  place.  We  have  needed  the  cour- 
age to  bid  the  most  stable  and  treasured  institutions 
a  glad  care-free  farewell ;  but  we  must  at  the  same 
time  honor  the  heritage  they  bequeath,  for  unless  the 
past  lives  in  us  we  shall  not  live  at  all.  It  is  the  fas- 
cinating task  of  the  social  psychologist  to  discover  the 
point  of  growth  in  each  tentative  social  expression, 
each  tenacious  moral  code ;  he  must  discriminate  in 
their  perpetual  dying  the  eternal  living. 

Socialists  have  been  peculiarly  slow  to  learn  this 
lesson.  The  Revolution  tossed  the  past  to  the  dust- 
heap  ;  the  liberalism  of  the  succeeding  epoch  let  it  lie 
there  for  the  most  part ;  and  the  more  violent  social- 
ist schools  to  this  day  frequently  amuse  themselves  by 
kicking  it  where  it  lies.  Yet  the  wiser  vision  of  evo- 
lutionary days  knows  that  we  must  obey  tradition  if 
we  would  insure  progress.  We  must  remember  that 
socialism  as  an  economic  theory  got  its  grip  only  at 
the  moment  when  Marx  taught  it  to  outgrow  the  rev- 
olutionary dogmatisms  of  its  youth  and  to  recognize 
its  true  strength  as  a  necessary  product  of  capitalism 
itself.  Socialism  as  a  spiritual  passion  can  prevail  only 
when  in  like  manner  it  claims  organic  union  with  the 
spiritual  evolution  behind  it. 

For  example :  the  word  "  mediaeval "  is  a  term  of 
contempt  or  reproach  on  most  socialist  lips.  Yet  the 
mediaeval  revival  in  literature,  religion,  and  art,  which 
has  persisted  against  such  heavy  odds  for  the^past 

285 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

hundred  years,  has  had  a  real  significance ;  and  we 
need  to  learn  that  the  ages  of  romance  have  as  much 
to  teach  to  the  sociologist  as  to  the  artist  or  the  priest. 
We  shall  never  get  at  their  worth  to  us  through  prim 
or  sentimental  imitations;  we  cannot  profit  by  the 
past  through  copying  it,  whether  in  Pre-Raphaelite 
pastiches,  picturesque  rituals,  or  artificially  fostered 
handicrafts.  We  may  no  more  hope  to  revive  mediaeval 
trade-guilds  than  to  renew  the  quaint  charm  of  the 
Primitives,  or  to  encounter  in  real  life  a  Giles  or  a 
Leo.  None  the  less,  we  should  seek  and  nourish  the  liv- 
ing force  which  inspired  these  early  types.  We  want 
no  dilettante  Pre-Raphaelitism  in  ethics ;  yet  the  curi- 
ously common  union  of  mediaeval  enthusiasm  with  so- 
cial radicalism  is  no  sentimental  folly ;  and  all  good 
socialists  should  catch  the  point  of  that  orthodox  Marx- 
ian, William  Morris,  who  contended  that  ever  since 
the  Middle  Ages  the  race  has  been  on  the  wrong  tack, 
and  that  we  must  go  back  to  recover  the  trail. 

What  Morris  cared  for  was  the  joy  in  life  and  labor, 
independent  of  worry  about  reward  ;  such  was  in  those 
days  a  prerogative  no  less  of  religious  than  of  indus- 
trial life.  Monasticism  held  distinct  prophetic  hints 
for  socialists.  Its  vast  services  to  agriculture  and  build- 
ing show  how  far  it  was  in  its  best  phases  from  for- 
bidding active  life,  and  prove  impressively  the  immense 
productive  force  inherent  in  communal  organization 
of  labor.  The  throngs,  including  so  many  choice  spirits, 
who  through  protracted  centuries  withdrew  happily 
to  the  shelter  of  the  monastery,  were  seeking  less  a 

286 


EECOVERIES 


chance  for  meditative  indolence  than  such  freedom 
from  worldly  cares  as  the  Master  had  enjoined.  Mo- 
nastic life  did  for  the  few  what  we  hope  socialism  will 
do  for  the  many ;  it  assigned  them  fixed  place,  in  an 
organic  group  which  regulated  socially  all  economic 
balances  that  affected  the  individual,  and  so  released 
him  from  responsibility  for  measuring  his  own  serv- 
ices. 

Despite  that  value  of  its  hints,  however,  monasti- 
cism  had  two  defects  which  prevent  its  interesting 
modern  democracy:  contemplation  was  after  all  cen- 
tral to  it,  action  incidental ;  and  it  attained  its  ends 
through  the  corporate  segregation  of  elect  individuals. 
The  Franciscan  movement,  on  the  other  hand,  carries 
us  out  into  the  open.  But  we  cannot  rest  even  with 
Francis  ;  for  the  goal  of  our  desires  is  no  militia,  how- 
ever voluntary,  of  spiritual  aristocrats  trained  to  fight 
a  losing  battle  against  perpetual  odds,  but  a  universal 
fellowship  of  effective  service.  Yet  if  we  combine  the 
principle  of  monasticism,  the  communal  organization 
of  life  and  labor,  with  the  Franciscan  standards  of  un- 
worldliness  and  devotion  carried  on  spontaneously 
among  normal  men,  we  gain  a  light  that  may  well 
illumine  our  path.  To  profit  by  it,  we  must  add  thought 
to  sympathy ;  for  it  takes  thinking  to  apply  the  prin- 
ciple of  conduct  which  has  been  proved  best  for  the 
individual,  to  social  and  collective  life.  This  is  what 
we  have  to  do.  Certain  principles  have  been  tested 
by  the  ages,  and  absolutely  proved  to  point  the  way 
to  productive  life  and  peace.  This  demonstration  is 

287 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

concluded ;  what  remains  is  to  create  conditions  in 
which  these  principles  shall  no  longer  contradict  the 
economic  structure,  but  shall  penetrate  and  transform 
it.  The  call  to  perfection  is  ever  the  same ;  it  is  the 
function  of  the  twentieth  century  to  reach  the  point 
where  not  only  an  elect  few  but  the  whole  race  shall 
be  free  to  follow  it. 

n 

The  nearer  we  approach  the  heart  of  things,  the 
more  we  shall  recognize  that  socialism  is  a  true  con- 
servative force.  Let  us  take  up  this  thesis  at  the  point 
where  it  appears  most  paradoxical,  —  the  socialist  at- 
titude toward  property. 

According  to  socialists,  the  next  step  in  human  pro- 
gress is  to  hound  the  instinctive  respect  for  the  sacred- 
ness  of  private  property  till  it  shrink  abashed  and 
worsted  to  its  lair.  Hideous,  unclean  instinct,  chief 
source  in  our  analysis  of  the  manifold  oppressions  in 
the  world !  How  rich  an  anthology  of  invective  against 
greed  for  ownership  can  be  culled  from  all  wise  saints 
and  sages,  past  Plato  and  the  early  Church  Fathers 
even  to  our  own  day!  How  keen  the  longing  to  be 
rid  of  this  passion,  which  is  the  root  of  that  desire  to 
escape  from  civilization,  at  work  in  modern  life  since 
the  time  of  Rousseau !  What  wonder  if  our  sympathies 
are  all  with  those  brave  spirits  who  have  revolted  from 
the  love  of  property,  —  with  Tolstoy,  with  Thoreau, 
with  Francis,  with  all  who  hate  and  flee  ? 

We  are  past  the  point  of  invective,  past  the  point 
288 


RECOVERIES 


of  flight.  The  cooperative  commonwealth  is  on  the 
way !  In  preparation  for  it,  what  more  heartening  task 
than  to  eradicate  the  old  tenacious  pleasure  in  exclu- 
sive possessions?  We  must  put  the  property-greed 
to  shame  by  appeal  to  that  noble  joy  in  sharing  which 
must  supplant  the  joy  in  owning  before  the  will  that 
obtains  in  paradise  can  be  realized  on  earth.  So  star- 
tling a  reversal  of  standards  calls  simultaneously  for 
legislative  enactment  and  for  inner  .discipline;  with 
"  serious  faith  and  inward  glee,"  and  with  the  inspir- 
iting sense  of  adventure,  we  bend  ourselves  to  the 
achievement. 

Yet  any  attempt  to  criticize  the  accepted  ethics  of 
property  occasions  a  terrified  recoil.  And  social  radi- 
cals make  a  bad  mistake  if  they  hear  in  such  recoil 
merely  the  insulted  outcry  of  crass  egotism.  Their 
analysis  must  get  deeper  than  that;  for  Carlyle's 
"Adamites"  can  never  hold  the  heart  of  the  world 
again. 

No  instinct  so  potent  throughout  history  as  the  prop- 
erty-sense can  have  been  in  itself  either  evil  or  delu- 
sive. It  has  developed  at  too  great  cost  and  has  had 
by-products  too  deplorable,  that  we  should  lightly  re- 
nounce the  goods  for  the  sake  of  which  Nature  has 
judged  these  sorrows  worth  enduring. 

Desire  for  property  has  been  the  chief  force  that 
has  led  man  on  from  savagery  to  civilization.  It  has 
been  the  incentive  in  progress,  the  base  of  marriage, 
the  bond  of  religion.  It  appears  as  soon  as  the  cave- 
man shapes  his  tools  or  the  nomad  nurtures  his  flocks ; 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

it  differentiates  man  from  beast.  At  bottom,  this  pas- 
sion represents  both  man's  accepted  responsibility 
toward  the  resources  of  Nature  and  his  grateful  de- 
pendence on  her.  It  gives  him  his  rightful  place  in 
the  scheme  of  things:  no  parasite  or  observer,  but 
a  guardian,  fulfilling  the  command  given  him  from  the 
beginning,  to  dress  and  keep  the  earth  with  jealous 
care.  He  is  not,  like  the  animals,  to  pass  over  her  sur- 
face like  a  shadow,  appearing  unnoted  and  vanishing 
unmissed ;  wherever  his  touch  falls  she  responds,  and 
we  may  picture  her  waiting  through  the  long  ages,  of- 
fering her  inhabitants  an  abiding-place  but  hardly  a 
home,  till  the  impulse  be  born,  competent  to  transform 
the  wilderness  into  the  fertile  field  and  the  jungle  into 
the  city.  Her  wealth  increases  and  her  glory  brightens 
as  during  the  centuries  man's  craving  to  possess  spurs 
him  to  enhance  and  develop  to  the  uttermost  the  gifts 
she  brings.  This  craving  leads  to  the  extension  of  per- 
sonality, for  a  man's  possessions  are  the  outward  ex- 
pression of  the  slow-growing  precious  sense  of  selfhood. 
He  could  not  have  realized  his  own  existence  otherwise 
than  through  such  extension  of  his  own  being  to  the 
inanimate  which  he  has  been  able  to  gather  into  his  em- 
brace ;  not  otherwise  could  the  earth  have  become  his  in- 
timate friend  and  in  a  certain  true  sense  his  creation. 
Property  is  then  as  sacred  as  the  most  sententious 
conservative  conceives.  It  is  the  gauge  and  witness  of 
our  fellowship  with  the  Creator,  and  we  must  learn 
to  reverence  it  more,  not  less,  deeply  as  civilization 
goes  on. 

290 


EECOVERIES 


One  hardly  sees,  moreover,  how  this  reverence  could 
have  been  developed  except  on  individualistic  lines. 
Certainly  to  strengthen  it  has  been  the  chief  function 
of  ( that  industrial  democracy  under  which  we  live.  It 
is  fashionable  to  decry  our  phase  of  social  development, 
partly  because  we  are  honestly  shocked  by  its  attend- 
ant evils,  partly  because  it  fails  to  satisfy  our  hunger 
for  romance,  and  largely  because  its  emphasis  on  material 
values  and  resources  fills  the  idealist  with  distaste.  Yet 
to  invest  the  passion  for  the  acquisition  of  wealth  with 
a  religious  sanctity  is  at  bottom  a  superb  achievement. 
The  industrial  age,  so  inferior  at  first  sight  to  the  feu- 
dal and  militant  ages,  has  displaced  from  the  centre 
of  our  admiration  the  man  who  destroys  by  the  man 
who  creates,  and  it  has  done  well.  Scientific  efficiency, 
the  conservation  of  natural  forces,  the  study,  how  to 
increase  riches  most  sanely,  abundantly,  and  swiftly, 
—  these  are  not  in  last  analysis  materialistic  aims. 
They  are  engendered  by  the  magnificent  modern  trust 
in  nature  as  a  friend  and  not  a  foe  to  the  spirit,  and 
are  charged  with  the  deepening  intuition  of  the  im- 
manence of  the  divine  in  the  natural.  It  is  not  only 
the  practical  experience  but  the  spiritual  vision  of  the 
last  two  centuries  which  has  helped  us  to  comprehend 
more  fully  the  sacredness  of  wealth  and  to  master  the 
secrets  of  its  production.  This  training  we  must  never 
disavow ;  and  the  time  will  come  when  we  shall  do  jus- 
tice to  that  individualistic  democracy  under  which 
mastership  over  the  processes  of  production  and  power 
in  gathering  riches  has  come  for  the  first  time  to 

291 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  CHARACTER 

constitute  as  high  a  title  to  honor  as  the  achievements 
of  physical  force. 

Meanwhile,  this  idealist  side  of  plutocracy  is  not 
the  only  one :  the  hand  of  Mammon  rests  heavily,  as 
in  Watts's  awful  picture,  on  the  heads  of  youth  and 
maiden ;  and  socialists  are  not  alone  in  shrinking  hor- 
rified from  the  evils  that  follow  in  the  train  of  un- 
checked permission  to  pursue  personal  gain.  They  be- 
come, however,  audacious  scouts  of  a  thought  not  yet 
accredited,  when  they  propose  to  limit  this  permission, 
demanding  that  free  competition  be  displaced  by  co- 
operation, and  that  the  power  of  the  individual  to 
amass  wealth  be  regulated  sharply  by  the  collective 
will.  Nor  can  we  wonder  if  people  who  revere  prop- 
perty  on  the  high  dispassionate  grounds  just  indicated 
find  this  demand  alarming. 

But  wait!  Is  it  really. the  socialists  who  threaten 
property  ?  Listen  to  our  old  friend,  the  "  Communist 
Manifesto  " :  — 

You  are  horrified  at  our  proposition  to  do  away  with  pri- 
vate property.  But  in  your  existing  society,  private  property 
is  already  done  away  with  for  nine  tenths  of  the  population. 
Its  existence  for  the  few  is  solely  due  to  its  non-existence  in 
the  hands  of  those  nine  tenths.  You  reproach  us,  therefore, 
with  intending  to  do  away  with  a  form  of  property,  the  neces- 
sary condition  for  whose  existence  is  the  non-existence  of 
any  property  for  the  immense  majority. 

Some  force  to  that.  In  a  society  in  which  every 
tenth  man  still  dies  a  pauper,  outcries  concerning  the 
sacrosanct  rights  of  property  ring  strangely  on  the  ear. 

292 


RECOVERIES 


We  socialists  seek  not  to  destroy  but  to  fulfill.  We 
want  to  strike  out  the  adjective  "  private  "  that  the 
full  force  of  the  noun  "  property"  may  be  realized.  The 
property-instinct  is  holy  and  creative  ;  but  we  perceive 
that  it  must  die  to  live,  obeying  the  secret,  universal 
law.  The  very  keenness  with  which  we  feel  the  value 
of  property  privileges  makes  us  desire  that  they  be 
no  longer  restricted  to  the  few,  but  thrown  open 
widely  as  the  gifts  of  the  good  earth.  This  is  why  we 
hold  that  a  time  has  come  to  begin  a  process,  which 
can  be  carried  on  as  slowly  as  wisdom  dictates,  for  the 
socialization  of  all  wealth-producing  wealth,  —  confi- 
dent that  only  as  this  process  advances  will  the  moral 
as  well  as  physical  benefits  of  possessions  be  put  within 
the  reach  of  the  majority. 

Socialism,  scrupulously  preserving  that  instinct  of 
responsibility  toward  mother  earth  which,  as  we  have 
seen,  is  the  crowning  prerogative  of  manhood,  seeks  to 
enlarge  its  scope  and  purify  its  aim.  For  ownership 
is  none  the  less  ownership  because  it  is  collective.  De- 
mocracy is  reacting  in  an  extraordinary  way  on  the 
idea  of  self,  at  once  deepening  and  widening  it.  The 
property-instinct  is,  as  we  have  just  seen,  an  intrinsic 
part  of  this  idea,  and  it  must  share  in  that  deepening 
and  widening.  Like  many  instincts  inherited  from  the 
childhood  of  the  race,  carefully  nurtured,  yet  to  a  de- 
gree held  in  abeyance  during  the  individualistic  phase 
of  development,  it  will  not  come  to  its  own  till  it  has 
found  itself  in  the  larger  life.  Progress  is  spiral ;  some 
day  the  prophetic  promise  of  the  old  days  of  tribal 

293 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

communism  will  be  fulfilled.  When  this  happens,  and 
not  till  then,  the  craving  for  property  will  be  an  un- 
mixed force  for  good  in  the  protection  and  advance- 
ment of  civilization. 

V  Meantime  the  long  divisive  experience  through  which 
respect  for  property  has  been  developed  has  been  a 
necessary  training-school;  nor  does  any  reasonable  so- 
cialist expect  that  the  principle  of  private  ownership 
can  ever  be  wholly  dispensed  with.  The  disciplines  af- 
forded by  the  more  intensive  forms  of  possession  will 
not  be  lost  to  us ;  for  as  far  as  the  eye  can  penetrate, 
such  wealth  as  can  be  held  for  consumption  will  be 
privately  owned.  Nor  is  it  likely  that  even  as  regards 
production  the  private  factor  will  wholly  disappear. 
The  complete  arrival  of  socialism  is  no  more  a  fixed 
point  than  the  full  leaving  of  a  tree.  Nature  never 
completes  one  evolutionary  process  before  starting  in 
on  another ;  her  methods  seem  painfully  ragged  and 
untidy  to  a  precise  mind ;  she  is  content  if  a  principle 
be  firmly  rooted  as  a  social  force  and  widely  even  if 
not  exclusively  operative.  But  it  is  a  very  educational 
moment  when  growth  is  first  visible,  and  at  such  a 
moment  we  live :  the  instinct  for  communal  as  distin- 
guished from  private  ownership  is  already  at  work  with 
triumphant  success  in  limited  areas  ;  it  increases  under 
our  eyes. 

•  Looking  back,  to  days  when  it  was  more  embryonic 
than  now,  we  can  see  that  it  has  never  been  absent. 
Modest  yet  not  insignificant  achievement  has  always 
been  inspired  by  the  impulse  to  add  to  the  common 


RECOVERIES 


stock ;  this  not  only  in  such  forms  as,  let  us  say,  "  Par- 
adise Lost "  or  the  Wagnerian  cycle,  but  on  more  prac- 
tical lines  such  as  scientific  discoveries.  Under  the 
modern  stress  of  the  most  individualistic  stimuli  ever 
experienced  by  society,  all  ownership  that  has  savor  for 
respectable  people  is  still  common  to  a  limited  degree. 
Not  only  shame  but  a  deeper  instinct  would  destroy  a 
man's  pleasure  in  a  delicate  dish  set  before  him  alone 
while  his  comrades  at  the  table  ate  coarsely.  Few  women 
like  to  wear  an  expensive  dress  while  their  own  sisters 
are  poverty-stricken.  The  family  remains  largely  a 
communal  group,  and  we  may  notice  that  the  impulse 
to  share  which  it  engenders  reaches  far  beyond  the 
immediate  or  the  visible.  There  is  something  potent, 
religious,  in  the  feeling  of  the  scion  of  an  ancient  house 
toward  that  abode  in  which  he  is  for  a  brief  moment 
sojourner  and  guardian,  while  knowing  that  it  belongs 
to  no  paltry  son  of  a  day  but  to  an  unbroken  line. 
Ancestral  houses  are  at  a  discount  in  a  democracy ; 
but  the  impulse  of  stewardship,  so  nobly  successful 
when  developed  along  hereditary  lines,  may  well  be  a 
power  equally  strong  when  we  extend  it  laterally,  so 
to  speak,  beyond  those  of  a  man's  own  blood,  to  all  his 
brethren  and  successors  in  the  spirit. 

It  is  delightful  to  see  how  freely  the  best  members 
of  the  fortunate  classes  are  coming  to  confess  that  they 
can  no  longer  take  the  simple  pleasure  of  their  fore- 
bears in  personal  possessions  or  immunities.  On  the 
other  hand,  among  evolved  and  sensitive  people,  group- 
ownership  affords  a  peculiarly  pure  type  of  happiness, 

295 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

and  enjoyment  of  possessions  increases  almost  geomet- 
rically in  proportion  to  the  copartnership  of  others. 
The  British  Museum  is  more  lovingly  tended  than  any 
private  library ;  and  bibliophiles  even  now  collect  with 
as  much  zest  for  communal  uses  as  for  their  own.  The 
feeling  of  a  civilized  man  for  his  church  or  his  uni- 
versity is  certainly  more  liberating  and  radiant  than 
that  for  his  yacht  or  his  automobile.  One  of  the  best 
things,  indeed,  about  an  institution  like  a  college  is 
the  opportunity  for  such  experience  that  it  offers.  The 
joy  of  sons  or  daughters  returning  to  their  alma  mater 
emancipates  and  uplifts :  the  college  is  a  part  of  their 
personality;  it  is  entwined  with  the  very  fibres  of  their 
being ;  theirs  for  use  and  delight,  theirs  for  service  and 
fostering.  And  the  best  of  their  pleasure  is  that  hosts 
of  comrades,  dead,  living,  and  unborn,  share  the  pos- 
session with  them.  In  like  manner,  the  rapture  aroused 
by  visiting  a  great  public  reserve  like  the  Yosemite  is 
touched  by  a  religious  joy  which  the  more  egotistic  sat- 
isfaction in  one's  own  lawn  or  garden  is  impotent  to 
stir.  The  pleasure  we  take  in  egotistic  forms  of  pos- 
session is  increasingly  shadowed  by  restlessness,  com- 
punction, and  distrust ;  the  pleasure  inspired  by  com- 
munal goods  has  a  vitality  that  belongs  to  what  in  us 
is  immortal. 

True,  there  is  ground  enough  for  discouragement. 
Any  one  scanning  ruefully  the  mess  left  in  a  private 
park  thrown  open  to  the  mob  for  a  holiday  may  well 
feel  that  the  irresponsibility  of  the  beast  is  not  far 
from  us,  and  may  be  pardoned  if  he  vows  to  defer  the 

296 


RECOVERIES 


cooperative  commonwealth  as  long  as  possible.  Yet 
parks  in  Switzerland,  bearing  the  pretty  inscription, 
"  Put  under  the  Protection  of  the  Public,"  suffer  no 
such  devastations ;  is  the  contrast  possibly  due  to  the 
presence  of  the  real  property-instinct  in  the  one  case, 
and  the  peculiar  absence  of  it  when  people  are  let 
loose  in  a  region  owned  by  some  remote  Olympian, 
toward  which  they  bear  no  personal  relation  whatever  ? 
A  sense  of  ownership  is  a  sobering  thing.  Students  in 
a  new  college  library,  rebuked  for  shaking  ink  over 
the  floors,  naively  defended  themselves  on  the  score 
that  the  library  was  not  theirs.  Patient  instruction  in 
collective  ownership  bore  its  fruit,  and  floors  in  "  our  " 
library  are  now  kept  imnfaculate  even  by  freshmen. 
It  is  obvious  that  a  long  and  sharp  discipline  awaits 
us  before  we  shall  be  ready  for  common  possessions: 
many  a  generation  must  pass  before  we  outgrow  ex- 
travagance, greed,  irresponsibility,  and  the  sheer  wicked 
habit  of  waste.  But  this  is  a  reason  for  pressing  rather 
than  delaying  the  training. 

So  does  the  passion  for  ownership  slowly  sink  deeper, 
enlarge  its  scope,  and  lose  life  to  find  it  again  in  a  so- 
cialized transformation.  When  thoroughly  exalted  into 
a  common  privilege  and  sobered  by  the  consciousness 
of  a  common  duty,  it  will  come  for  the  first  time  to 
its  own.  For  it  is  not  sentimental  cant  but  scientific 
fact  that  nothing  is  really  possessed  till  it  be  shared ; 
and  the  wider  the  sharing  the  truer  the  possession. 
The  one  thing  we  all  surely  possess  is  the  sky ;  and 
if  we  had  to  choose  between  the  roof-tree  and  the 

297 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

open  heaven,  the  roof -tree,  for  most  of  us,  would  have 
to  go :  — 

Nichts  anders  sturzet  dich  in  Hollenschlund  hinein 

Als  der  verhazte  Wort,  —  (merk's  wohl !)  das  Mein  uud  Dein.1 

Only  the  meek  inherit  the  earth,  and  so  long  as  we 
guard  the  goods  of  earth  for  that  common  inheritance 
we  cannot  be  too  acquisitive.  Let  us  enhance  our  sense 
of  the  sacredness  of  property  till  it  shall  become  im- 
possible for  the  least  or  weakest  to  find  himself  a 
homeless  wanderer  in  this  heritage  which  is  his  own. 

Ill 

Among  the  other  restorf  tions  that  await  the  good 
socialist  is  renewal  of  faith  in  the  guides  of  his  youth. 
Let  him  re-read  his  Mazzini,  his  Ruskin,  his  Nietzsche, 
his  Tolstoy:  the  familiar  pages  gain  a  new  signifi- 
cance in  addition  to  their  old  charm.  They  had  disap- 
pointed him  sorely  when  he  sought  finality  in  them ; 
they  acquire  immense  and  permanent  worth  now,  as 
the  unconscious  revelation  of  process ;  for  that  quest  of 
social  justice  through  the  "  wilderness  of  a  wide  world 
in  an  atheistic  century/'  of  which  they  are  the  bril- 
liant record,  led  straight  to  the  socialist  goal,  and  every 
positive  ideal  which  the  Masters  urged  falls  into  place 
as  a  vital  factor  in  that  great  socialist  synthesis  where 
alone  it  can  be  fulfilled. 

True,  one  hardly  hopes  at  first  to  lure  the  regiment 
which  marches  under  the  banner,  "  Abandon  civiliza- 
1  Angelus  SUesius. 


RECOVERIES 


tion !  "  into  the  socialist  camp.  For  socialism  refuses 
to  give  civilization  up  as  a  bad  job,  with  either  the 
recluse  or  the  anarchist.  Yet  have  we  not  seen  that 
socialism  promises  the  only  true  Return  to  Nature, 
albeit  its  Golden  Age  lie  before  and  not  behind  ?  Is 
not  its  final  aim  that  power  to  achieve  an  unfettered 
individuality  for  which  Ibsen,  Nietzsche,  and  the  rest 
were  clamoring?  In  the  socialist  state  we  hope  that 
the  way  will  be  open  for  all  of  us  to  become  supermen, 
and  we  may  advance  on  the  road  thither  with  solemn 
gayety  equal  to  that  of  Zarathustra,  untroubled  by 
compunction,  since  assured  that  neither  we  nor  society 
is  to  blame  if  the  majority  are  too  lazy  to  follow.  So- 
cialism may  heal  society  in  its  inward  parts,  for  it  may 
cure  that  disease  of  self-consciousness  which  has  for  so 
long  affected  our  industrial  vitals,  and  may  render  the 
performance  of  economic  function  as  majestically  auto- 
matic as  the  large  and  liberal  harmonies  of  nature.  So 
it  may  meet  in  a  practical  and  sensible  way  the  cravings 
to  regain  the  simplicities  of  Eden,  may  reconcile  at  last 
individual  freedom  with  social  usefulness,  and  may  pro- 
vide a  social  order  in  which  all  the  more  decent  people 
in  Ibsen's  dramas  might  actually  be  reconciled  to  life. 
But  of  course  the  clearest  previsions  of  socialism 
are  to  be  found  in  that  nobler  group  among  modern 
idealists  who  have  sought  not  to  abandon  civilization 
but  to  moralize  it.  Gather  their  various  counsels  to- 
gether :  one  has  practically  drawn  up  the  socialist  pro- 
gram. In  view  of  the  extraordinary  fullness  with 
which  the  most  detached  and  fertile  minds  of  the  last 

299 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

century  anticipated  the  very  creed  they  disavowed, 
their  rejection  of  socialism  appears  astonishing.  The 
explanation,  however,  has  been  anticipated  by  the 
whole  course  of  this  discussion.  As  we  saw  at  the  outset, 
socialism  could  not  find  a  firm  foothold  till  the  social 
structure  and  the  mental  life  were  saturated  with  evo- 
lution and  democracy;  and  not  one  of  these  men  of 
imagination  and  vision  gave  his  allegiance  to  both 
principles.  Their  social  cosmology  was  Ptolemaic  rather 
than  Copernican,  and  they  all  agreed  in  trying  to 
reconcile  their  disturbing  and  awe-inspiring  glimpses 
of  a  new  order  pressing  toward  the  light,  with  a 
mystical  and  static  view  of  the  universe.  Nor  can  we 
blame  their  recoil  from  the  new  ideas.  Democracy 
was  confounding  itself,  now  with  that  cheap  liberalism 
which  all  clear-sighted  men  denounced  as  the  very 
source  of  our  social  evils,  now  with  anarchy  and  revo- 
lution. Evolutionary  doctrines  carried  with  them  in 
the  economic  as  in  the  physical  sphere  a  connotation 
of  materialistic  fatalism.  Time  had  to  accomplish  its 
work.  When  the  true  bearing  of  these  doctrines  had 
been  made  plain,  their  trend  toward  socialism  was  mani- 
fest. 

Just  in  proportion  as  social  idealists  approach  the 
democratic  and  evolutionary  point  of  view  does  their 
work  to-day  ring  modern ;  and  by  the  same  sign,  just 
in  this  proportion  does  it  draw  near  to  socialism.  Dec- 
ade by  decade,  from  Carlyle  in  the  thirties  to  Arnold 
in  the  opening  eighties,  one  can  watch  the  slow  growth 
of  confidence  in  the  plain  people.  It  is  the  glory  of 

300 


EECOVERIES 


Mazzini  that  this  faith  was  native  to  him,  and  had  he 
supplemented  it  by  the  evolutionary  vision  there  would 
have  been  nothing  antiquated  about  his  writing  to- 
day. Even  Kuskiii,  losing  heart  in  his  gallant  effort 
to  arouse  the  conscience  of  the  privileged,  presented 
during  the  seventies  in  "  Fors  Clavigera  "  an  appeal  to 
the  masses  for  help  in  social  redemption,  at  once  comic 
in  its  misapprehension  of  working-class  psychology 
and  touching  in  its  forlorn  hope.  But  it  was  Matthew 
Arnold,  audacious  and  illumined  spirit,  who  finally 
set  the  aristocratic  tradition  at  defiance  in  both  lines. 
Himself  aristocrat  ingrain,  he  was  yet  borne  onward 
by  the  tide,  and  first  among  the  dreamers  bade  wel- 
come, sober  if  terrified,  to  that  flux  in  human  affairs 
which  was  carrying  us,  beyond  the  epoch  of  concen- 
tration when  aristocracies  are  in  order,  into  the  demo- 
cratic age.  Despite  his  ignorant  and  contemptuous 
treatment  of  the  People  in  "  Culture  and  Anarchy," 
a  "  Power  not  himself  "  forced  him  to  recognize  the 
growing  importance  of  their  role ;  and  the  title  of  a 
late  essay,  "  Ecce  Convertimur  ad  Gentes,"  may  be 
taken  as  a  significant  turning-point,  to  mark  the  very 
moment  when  English  thought  abandoned  its  reluc- 
tant fears  and  in  the  person  of  its  keenest  critic  and 
most  civilized  son,  turned  from  privileged  to  proleta- 
riat as  the  hope  of  the  future.  By  his  passion  for 
equality,  his  faith  in  the  State,  his  quest  for  a  social 
as  distinguished  from  a  political  program,  Arnold  is 
a  socialist  in  all  but  name.  His  social  criticism  be- 
longs mainly  to  the  decade  of  the  seventies;  it  marks 

301 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

the  culmination  of  the  long  unconscious  process  by 
which,  ever  since  the  days  of  "  Sartor  Resartus  "  just 
before  the  dawn  of  the  Victorian  era,  the  honest  but 
always  deliberate  Anglo-Saxon  mind  has  been  log- 
ically impelled  toward  the  very  faith  from  which  it 
shrank.  A  few  years  more,  and  William  Morris  was 
preaching  at  street -corners,  the  Fabians  had  begun 
their  stimulating  crusade,  and  Continental  socialism 
was  invading  the  British  Isles,  to  receive  inevitable 
local  modifications  even  while  it  taught  an  invaluable 
lesson.  We  socialists,  who  take  keen  interest  in  survey- 
ing letters  from  the  social  point  of  view,  love  to  look 
back  over  the  whole  process  from  our  post  in  the 
twentieth  century,  and  we  find  in  the  vivid  tentative 
literature  of  the  century  that  precedes  us  a  record 
singularly  complete  and  impressive  of  the  great  tran- 
sition which  has  ended  in  the  clearer  outlook  and  more 
inspiring  conviction  of  these  good  later  days. 

IV 

Renewal  of  comradeship  with  theorists  is  much ; 
better  still  is  renewal  of  comradeship  with  men  of  ac- 
tion. This  joy  also  awaits  the  socialist  if  he  is  a 
reasonable  being.  Socialists  are  not  always  reasonable ; 
they  are  prone  bitterly  and  impatiently  to  decry  phi- 
lanthropy and  reform.  Nor  can  we  wholly  blame  them, 
since  our  own  zeal  for  both  grew  sadly  lukewarm  when 
we  tried  to  consider  them  an  adequate  remedy  for 
industrial  wrong.  And  so  far  as  philanthropy  is  simply 
a  sedative  to  the  public  conscience,  and  reform  a  mere 

302 


RECOVERIES 


series  of  palliatives,  we  must  still  regard  them  as  a 
force  inhibiting  progress,  and  their  valiant  devotees  as 
laborers  all  unwittingly  on  the  side  of  darkness. 

But  while  these  dangers  are  not  imaginary,  it  is 
obvious  that  philanthropy  and  reform  have  other  more 
permanent  and  valuable  functions.  Considered  as  ends, 
they  may  be  misleading  fallacies ;  considered  as  means, 
they  are  necessary  instruments.  As  social  develop- 
ment goes  on,  they  prove  more  and  more  to  be  no  com- 
forting anodyne  but  a  quickening  stimulant.  They 
educate  where  no  socialist  propaganda  can  reach,  and 
for  one  person  whom  they  lull,  they  awaken  a  dozen. 
Even  the  most  shallow  surface  philanthropy  plays  an 
enlightening  role.  How  establish  a  hospital  for  blind 
babies  without  being  forced  to  turn  a  searchlight  on 
that  dark  region  where  questions  of  sexual  morality 
are  so  inextricably  tangled  with  industrial  problems? 
How  enter  on  a  campaign  to  insure  the  workman 
against  industrial  accidents  without  encountering  that 
dogged  meanness  on  the  part  of  a  certain  class  of 
manufacturers,  which  calls  for  wider-spread  protective 
legislation  ?  One  watches  this  process  on  every  hand. 
We  need  not  haggle  over  a  name.  When  our  desired 
social  order  arrives,  it  may  have  been  approached  so 
unconsciously  that  it  will  refuse  to  call  itself  socialist 
at  all.  Nevertheless,  if  the  historian,  looking  back  from 
its  pleasant  leisure,  tries  to  retrace  the  path  that  led 
men  there  he  will  be  able  to  tell  dramatically  enough 
how  swift  and  steady  was  the  logic  of  the  process. 
Once,  poverty  was  construed  as  result  of  the  sin  or 

303 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

weakness  of  the  poor.  Soon,  as  pitying  passion  swept 
into  broader  channels  under  the  influence  of  evolution 
and  democracy,  the  cause  was  traced  farther  back  and 
found  in  the  sins  of  the  rich.  Presently  this  imperfect 
diagnosis  was  discarded  in  turn,  in  favor  of  the  ex- 
igencies of  that  industrial  order  to  which  all  men  were 
captive.  Presently  it  is  seen  that  to  transform  this 
order  is  within  our  power ;  and  when  this  inspiring 
conviction  is  reached,  modern  methods  supplant  me- 
diaeval, philanthropy  yields  to  reform,  and  reform 
itself  passes  through  swiftly  changing  phases  till  it 
leads  to  that  other  country  across  the  socialist  border, 
where  already  we  happy  pilgrims  stand  with  a  goodly 
and  increasing  host. 

The  philanthropic  movement,  then,  is  quickening 
the  hearts  of  all  its  chosen  to  see  beyond  its  own  con- 
fines. And  it  has  further  values  also.  Surely,  for  one 
thing,  its  reactions  on  the  poor  need  not  wholly  be  de- 
spised. Even  at  their  simplest  face  value,  they  are 
blessed ;  why  should  the  most  ardent  socialist  sneer  at 
the  help  and  comfort  given  to  individuals?  To  trans- 
plant pallid  little  flowers  of  the  slums  for  a  week  to 
country  soil,  to  help  tenement-house  mothers  make  the 
best  of  their  slender  resources,  is  a  pursuit  at  lowest 
as  innocuous  as  golf  or  bridge.  So  long  as  battles  exist, 
the  wounded  must  be  cared  for,  and  Red  Cross  work 
may  well  be  sustained  even  by  the  most  vigorous  sup- 
porters of  the  Peace  Movement.  Moreover,  these  ex- 
pressions of  the  art  of  pity  have  more  than  face  value. 
They  bear  a  real  if  limited  relation  to  the  deeper  task 

304 


EECOVERIES 


of  social  reconstruction.  For  philanthropy,  as  it  be- 
comes democratized,  does  in  detail  at  least  afford  some 
effective  help  to  misery ;  and  just  in  proportion  as  the 
burden  is  lifted  off  the  poor,  however  slightly,  by  ac- 
cident insurance,  housing  reform,  or  what  you  will, 
we  shall  gain  a  proletariat  more  enlightened  and  vig- 
orous and  better  equipped  for  its  God-given  task  of 
leading  the  social  revolution. 

But  the  ultimate  function  of  our  activities  in  philan- 
thropy and  reform  is  wider  than  we  have  yet  signaled : 
they  are  training  all  their  advocates  practically  for 
the  good  day  in  which  they  do  not  believe. 

We  made  melancholy  fun  a  while  ago  of  that  spirit 
of  organization  which  to  an  almost  ludicrous  degree 
suppresses  personal  impulses  in  both  charity  and  in- 
dustry. Yet  if  that  spirit  has  taken  away  from  us  a 
beloved  past,  it  owes  us  the  promise  of  a  fairer  future ; 
if  the  complex  mechanism  which  a  social  democracy 
will  call  for  is  to  operate  smoothly,  success  will  be 
largely  due  to  this  very  development ;  for  with  all  its 
trying  disciplines,  all  its  unlovely  features,  such  devel- 
opment is  no  mechanical  fact ;  it  is  a  spiritual  necessity. 
Kropotkin's  idea,  that  voluntary  associations  will  in 
time  prove  competent  to  administer  all  social  interests 
and  will  take  the  place  of  any  central  government, 
may  well  seem  extreme ;  yet  the  informal  groups  form- 
ing on  every  hand  for  social  service  surely  prefigure 
such  types  of  voluntary  cooperation  to  public  ends  as 
may  some  day  control  large  social  interests.  Our  phi- 
lanthropic activities  not  only  purge  the  vision :  they 

305 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

train  the  powers ;  they  are  phases  in  the  swift  rise  of 
a  social  ethic  which  is  transforming  not  merely  the 
face  of  our  civilization  but  the  habits  of  our  souls. 
We  are  learning  to  live  together  ;  and  when  the  lesson 
shall  have  been  thoroughly  learned,  socialism  will 
present  no  difficulties,  for  it  will  operate  as  a  matter  of 
course. 

It  is  possible  that  those  innumerable  fibres  of  red 
tape,  which  seem  to  entangle  our  very  souls,  are  the 
"organic  filaments"  which  Carlyle  saw  weaving  the 
new  web  while  the  old  is  rotting.  Let  us  take  heart 
of  grace.  Committees  multiply,  oppressing  us  cruelly, 
suppressing  us  sadly ;  yet  through  the  very  cumber- 
someness  and  seeming  futility  of  their  machinery 
they  offer  the  best  possible  occasion  for  mastering 
the  methods  and  attitude  called  for  by  the  coopera- 
tive commonwealth.  When  we  are  bored  with  our 
meticulous  fellow  members,  rasped  by  temperamental 
antagonisms,  depressed  by  the  discrepancy  between 
means  and  aims,  we  may  remember  that  we  are  under 
a  necessary  drill  in  collective  activity.  Yes,  though  we 
chafe  like  wild  creatures  pinioned  in  a  net  of  motions 
and  amendments,  though  we  gasp  like  a  swimmer 
submerged  in  oceans  of  words,  let  us  lift  our  weary 
eyes  toward  that  coming  state  whose  success  or  failure 
will  depend  on  our  power  to  work  together  harmoni- 
ously. Our  handling  of  the  situation  is  the  test  of 
our  fitness  to  be  socialist  citizens.  All  the  capacity 
we  can  develop  is  useful  now,  —  the  delicacies  of  self- 
subordination,  the  audacities  of  self-assertion,  the 

306 


RECOVERIES 


power  to  reach  our  ends  through  the  seeming  initi- 
ative of  others,  the  tact,  forbearance,  tenacity,  —  but 
these  traits  will  be  more  useful  later.  Each  discovery 
of  means  to  expedite  the  movements  of  large  bodies, 
each  graceful  compromise  in  non-essentials,  each  cheer- 
ful persistence  in  essentials,  all  open-mindedness,  all 
fidelity  to  truth  have  their  part  in  strengthening  our 
loyalty  to  the  Whole,  and  preparing  us  for  harmonious 
and  effective  living  in  a  social  democracy. 


And  if  the  rank  and  file  of  social  workers  on  organ- 
ized lines  become  unconsciously  trained  in  socialized 
living,  no  less  than  in  the  disinterested  and  social 
point  of  view,  still  more  striking  is  the  development 
by  this  means  of  the  qualities  of  leadership  impera- 
tively demanded  by  the  future. 

Whither  shall  the  socialist  state  look  for  its  leaders? 
The  question  is  constantly  asked  and  skeptically  an- 
swered. Of  a  bureaucracy  we  will  have  nothing.  Un- 
less leadership  can  be  a  natural  growth,  —  vital,  sensi- 
tive, disinterested,  democratic,  —  the  whole  structure 
of  our  cooperative  commonwealth  will  collapse  like  a 
house  of  cards.  Now  the  art  of  leadership  grows  more 
difficult  as  civilization  advances ;  and  the  savage  who 
can  play  the  part  of  chief  quijbe  effectively  to  his  sim- 
ple tribe  would  be  hardly  more  at  a  lo^s  than,  let  us 
say,  Gladstone  or  Cavour,  if  asked  to  guide  the  im- 
mensely sensitive  and  complicated  social  organization 
of  the  future. 

307 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  CHARACTER 

One  is  obliged  to  confess  that  current  skepticism  is 
more  or  less  justified  if  one  looks  for  possible  leaders 
to  the  ranks  of  the  socialists  themselves,  at  least  as 
they  have  been  in  the  United  States  until  recently. 
Indeed,  it  may  be  even  questioned  whether  they  would 
make  the  best  citizens  in  a  social  democracy.  That 
sympathetic  critic,  Mr.  Herbert  Croly,  has  a  pertinent 
remark  in  "  The  Promise  of  American  Life  "  :  — 

Professional  socialists  may  cherish  the  notion  that  their 
battle  is  won  as  soon  as  they  can  secure  a  permanent  pop- 
ular majority  in  favor  of  a  socialist  policy ;  but  the  con- 
structive national  democrat  cannot  logically  accept  such  a 
comfortable  illusion.  The  action  of  a  majority  composed 
of  the  ordinary  type  of  convinced  socialists  could  and  would 
in  a  few  years  do  more  to  make  socialism  impossible  than 
could  be  accomplished  by  the  best  and  most  prolonged 
efforts  of  a  majority  of  malignant  anti-socialists. 

Socialists  may  preach  the  socialist  state  with  elo- 
quence ;  they  may  even  bring  it  in.  But  it  is  highly 
questionable  whether,  at  least  in  the  United  States  of 
America,  they  would  be  able  to  manage  it.  They  are 
occupied  with  denunciation  and  propaganda  rather 
than  with  the  problems  of  constructive  statesmanship ; 
at  their  best  the  stamp  of  the  doctrinaire  and  the  theo- 
rist is  still  upon  them ;  at  their  average,  it  must  be 
confessed  that  they  are  sometimes  sadly  lazy  about 
self -discipline  and  quarrelsome  in  action.  Miss  Addams, 
in  "  Twenty  Years  at  Hull  House,"  describes  with 
vivid  sympathy  the  group  of  eager  thinkers  who  used 
to  wile  away  the  nights  a  quarter-century  ago  with 

308 


RECOVERIES 


clever  visionary  discussions  of  social  theory.  Very 
quietly  she  remarks  that  as  the  years  went  on,  and 
practical  movements  for  social  amelioration  got  act- 
ually under  weigh,  the  effective  and  self-sacrificing 
leaders  appeared,  not  from  among  these  stimulating 
theorists,  but  from  the  ranks  of  plain  Chicago  business 
men.  The  same  story  is  repeated  still.  The  mental 
traveler  who  leaves  the  camp  of  the  reformers  for 
that  of  the  socialists  is  dazed,  delighted,  invigorated, 
so  long  as  simple  propaganda  and  discussion  are  the 
order  of  the  day.  Let  the  test  of  action  come,  and  he 
watches,  too  often  in  vain,  for  the  patient  and  far- 
seeing  qualities  of  practical  leadership.  Yet  why  not 
in  vain?  It  is  in  a  different  school  from  expectation 
and  restless  theory  that  these  qualities  are  developed ! 
He  must  also  echo  the  popular  distrust  of  the  usual 
type  of  leader  evolved  in  contemporary  politics ;  and 
at  this  moment  of  discouragement  he  may  well  revert 
in  love  and  relief  to  his  old  friends  the  reformers, 
who  have  known  the  discipline  of  the  task  while  the 
new  have  rested  in  the  joy  of  the  vision. 

In  the  groups  associated  for  definite  ends  of  reform 
both  the  social  conscience  and  the  capacity  for  effective 
social  action  are  growing  with  astonishing  rapidity. 
Where  shall  we  look  for  the  destined  leaders  of  the 
cooperative  commonwealth  ?  Where,  better  than  to  the 
men  and  women  trained  in  disinterested  administra- 
tion of  matters  concerning  social  welfare :  here  and 
now  fighting  tuberculosis,  building  garden  cities,  plan- 
ning improved  tenements,  creating  playgrounds, 

309 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

administering  settlements,  organizing  "  Consumers' 
Leagues  "  and  "  Pittsburg  Surveys  "  ?  To  these  people, 
brotherhood  has  been  more  than  a  name.  They  are 
working  practically  and  patiently  to  realize  it  in  one 
little  sphere  or  another,  while  the  socialists  have  rev- 
eled in  political  propaganda  and  spicy  journalism,  and 
current  commercialized  politics  have  been  chiefly  pro- 
lific in  graft. 

There  is  one  other  direction  to  which  we  may  turn. 
Our  curious  generation  is  evoking  the  qualities  of 
leadership  on  two  lines  diametrically  opposed,  —  social 
service  and  high  finance !  The  powers  of  generalship 
possessed  by  the  Rockefellers  and  Morgans  of  the 
future  will  assuredly  find  plenty  of  scope  in  directing 
the  vast  energies  of  the  cooperative  commonwealth; 
nor  need  we  doubt  that  pleasure  in  enterprise  and 
fame  will  afford  quite  as  much  satisfaction  to  gentle- 
men of  this  order  as  they  gain  to-day  from  the  fact  — 
even  now  more  or  less  incidental  to  the  best  of  them — 
of  accumulating  money.  But  though  the  financier  is 
being  trained  to-day  pour  cause,  and  will  doubtless 
have  his  function,  most  of  us  turn  with  more  sense  of 
confidence  to  those  other  leaders  of  men,  the  social 
workers,  who  are  probably  the  most  characteristic  as 
they  are  certainly  the  finest  product  of  our  modern 
democracy.  For  these  have  the  exact  traits  that  will 
be  needed  to  head  the  communal  governments  of  the 
future :  — the  social  point  of  view,  involving  keen  in- 
sight into  the  necessities  of  healthy  social  and  civic 
life ;  the  administrative  experience  and  business  ef- 

310 


KECOVERIES 


ficiency ;  the  ready  intuition  into  social  reactions  and 
the  quick  and  practiced  powers  of  associated  action 
toward  impersonal  ends.  To  these  men,  who  practice 
fellowship  while  others  talk  of  it,  to  these,  who  already 
obey  what  must  be  the  guiding  code  of  the  New  Order, 
even  although  faith  in  that  order  be  not  yet  vouch- 
safed them,  we  must  turn  rather  than  to  theorists  or 
dreamers  to  administer  that  society  which  will  rest 
on  fellowship  as  on  its  corner-stone.  Surely  it  is  by  a 
wonderful  provision,  albeit  one  proceeding  like  all  else 
from  the  necessities  of  economic  progress,  that  while 
the  theorists  are  preaching  the  socialist  state  —  and 
indulging  at  times  in  very  individualistic  practices  — 
the  segregation  of  philanthropic  and  social  activities  is 
producing  the  precise  types  to  which  that  state  must 
look  for  its  leaders. 

So  religious  socialists  regain  reverence  for  their  old 
comrades,  even  to  the  point  of  hailing  them  as  mas- 
ters of  the  future.  Apart  from  the  passive  movement 
of  economic  forces  which  drives  us  toward  political  so- 
cialism, their  methods  would  never  right  our  wrongs. 
The  recognition  of  this  fact  has  driven  us  out  from 
the  ranks  of  the  reformers,  to  take  our  place  frankly 
under  the  red  flag.  Yet  those  who  sneer  at  philan- 
thropy and  reform  are  out  of  touch  with  the  realities 
of  the  unfolding  order,  and  their  doom  may  come  when 
the  civilization  for  which  they  so  eagerly  clamor  shall 
reject  their  leadership  and  turn  to  those  who,  having 
been  faithful  over  a  few  things,  are  fitted  to  be  rulers 
over  many. 

311 


THE  FUTURE  OF  CHARACTER 

Thus  a  series  of  joyful  surprises  awaits  in  the  full- 
ness of  time  the  seeker  who  has  left  his  own  people 
and  his  father's  house,  yet  is  still  a  little  wistful  about 
the  good  things  he  has  turned  from.  First,  he  finds 
that  the  future  of  his  dreams  holds  promise  of  fulfill- 
ment to  all  the  fairest  aspirations  and  tradition  of  the 
religious  past ;  then,  that  the  deepest  instincts  and 
reactions  which  have  sustained  the  social  order  will 
remain  the  permanent  props  of  life.  The  best  elements 
in  the  teachings  of  his  honored  masters,  precipitated 
from  chaos,  shine  in  ordered  crystalline  significance ; 
the  old  pursuits  which  he  had  sorrowfully  abandoned 
renew  more  than  their  former  value.  Finally,  appre- 
ciation of  his  former  comrades  in  the  social  struggle  is 
restored  fourfold.  They  may  not  raise  their  eyes  to  his 
East ;  none  the  less  are  they  working  in  the  cause  of 
sunlight,  as  they  pull  away  the  piled-up  corruptions 
that  hide  the  heavens,  and  flash  their  lanterns  at  one 
point  or  another  on  the  great  task  which  all  must  unite 
to  achieve.  When  that  task  shall  be  accomplished  none 
will  rejoice  more  earnestly  than  these ;  and  they  who 
have  learned  in  such  intimate  detail  what  building  in- 
volves will  be  prepared  perhaps  better  than  any  other 
men  to  be  architects  of  the  social  structure  of  the 
future. 


PART  IV 
THE  FUTURE  OF  KELIGION 


PART  IV.  THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 
CHAPTER  I 

SOCIALISM  AND   THEISM 


IT  might  seem  that  our  story  was  finished  ;  for  we 
have  surely  vindicated  the  chances  of  character  under 
socialism  when  we  have  shown  that  the  principles  of 
the  Beatitudes  will  no  longer  have  to  maintain  them- 
selves against  the  trend  of  things,  but  will  become  as 
truly  the  law  for  social  progress  as  they  are  now  the 
law  for  individual  holiness. 

Yet,  wonderful  though  this  change  promises  to  be, 
it  will  not  content  us  in  itself.  For  ethics  alone  will 
never  satisfy  the  human  soul  so  long  as  the  stars  shine 
overhead.  Socialists  cannot  be  exonerated  from  the 
charge  of  stupidity  on  this  point.  It  is  natural  enough 
that,  impatient  of  the  long  tradition  which  preached 
a  smug  heaven  to  a  proletariat  in  chains,  crude  spirits 
should  in  reaction  deify  the  flesh  and  coin  religion 
from  revolt.  Perhaps  it  is  natural  also  that  those  who 
think  on  a  higher  level  should  claim  to  find  in  their 
creed  a  religious  inspiration,  —  an  impelling  power,  a 
sustaining  hope,  a  purifying  emotion*  Yet  how  can 
we  help  reminding  them  that  no  theory  or  system  of 
purely  human  relations  can  in  the  long  run  offer  a 
religion  ?  No  thinker  was  ever  yet  satisfied  with  the 

315 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  RELIGION 

description  given  by  St.  James.  To  do  justly  and  love 
mercy  is  all  very  well.  But  how  about  walking  humbly 
with  one's  God  ?  The  quest  for  union  with  the  Eternal 
is  no  delusion  of  the  childhood  of  the  race,  to  fade 
with  the  advance  of  day ;  it  is  the  deepest  necessity 
of  humanity's  manhood. 

Socialism  has  derived  much  of  its  power  from  the 
fact  that  it  supplied  the  need  for  ideal  passion  in  a 
century  when  theological  and  mystical  interests  were 
driven  into  far  recesses  of  existence  by  the  ardor  of 
scientific  progress  and  the  quest  for  material  prosperity. 
So,  grateful  to  a  civilization  wearily  dominated  by 
licensed  greed  is  that  image  of  a  pacific  and  fraternal 
order  which  it  holds  steadily  before  us,  that  we  can 
hardly  wonder  if  people  possessed  by  the  vision  confound 
their  sense  of  release  and  relief  with  the  peace  that 
passeth  understanding.  Yet  in  vain  did  Leigh  Hunt 
say  to  Shelley  that  humanity  would  find  its  true  re- 
ligion when  charity  supplanted  faith  as  a  working 
force.  In  vain  does  that  fine  spirit,  John  Spargo,  in 
his  book  on  "  The  Spiritual  Significance  of  Social- 
ism," tacitly  assume  —  with  how  many  others  —  that 
fraternal  feeling  translated  into  life  is  the  Alpha  and 
Omega  of  the  religious  consciousness.  The  burden  of 
proof  rests  on  the  school  of  these  thinkers,  not  on  those 
of  us  who  follow  the  evidence  of  all  human  history,  in 
holding  that  the  love  of  the  brother  seen  does  but  spur 
man  on  to  the  love  of  the  Unseen  God.  The  listening 
ear  of  the  race  can  never  cease  to  hearken  to  a  Voice 
that  speaks  out  of  the  silences  beyond  the  range  of 

316 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


time  and  sense.  The  illation  of  economic  and  social 
forces  to  the  travail  of  the  soul  is,  we  freely  admit, 
more  intimate  and  fundamental  than  pre- modern 
thought  surmised ;  yet  spiritual  activity  is  the  blossom- 
ing of  humanity's  garden,  —  at  once  the  end  of  all  en- 
richment of  soil  and  culture  of  root,  and  the  promise 
and  parent  of  what  fruit  the  race  has  to  present.  The 
desire  to  liberate  the  religious  life  is  accordingly  the 
highest  if  not  the  most  compelling  reason  we  have  for 
socializing  our  democracy ;  and  we  should  regard  that 
justice  which  our  best  powers  are  now  bent  to  attain, 
less  as  an  end  in  itself  than  as  the  preface  to  a  higher 
religious  evolution. 

For  religion,  like  ethics,  languishes  to-day  in  bond- 
age. The  imperative  necessity  of  putting  an  end  to 
the  infamous  conditions  under  which  the  majority  are 
living,  and  of  achieving  a  reasonable  degree  of  social 
justice,  more  and  more  diverts  the  devout  instincts 
of  the  heart  from  other  aspiration.  In  spite  of  the  just 
grievance  of  the  radicals  that  the  followers  of  the  Great 
Revolutionist  take  no  part  in  the  work  of  emancipa- 
tion, the  churches  themselves  feel  the  trend  of  the 
times.  They  shrink  from  drastic  reform,  but  they  oc- 
cupy themselves  increasingly  with  practical  ministra- 
tions. Preaching  tends  to  mere  humanitarianism,  often 
empty  enough.  Institutional  work,  secular  in  type  even 
if  carried  on  in  a  guild-house,  claims  the  energies  of 
the  faithful,  and  the  clergy  lament  that  executive  duties 
leave  them  scant  time  to  say  their  prayers.  Who  can 
wonder  that  a  counter-cry  to  the  socialists  arises  in 

317 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

quarters  where  mystical  traditions  linger?  In  the 
general  "  social "  crusade  that  now  obtains  in  the 
churches,  a  relentless  logic  suspects  no  sign  of  quicken- 
ing life,  but  a  deluded  conformity  on  the  part  of  the 
very  strongholds  of  idealism  to  the  general  material- 
ism that  threatens  to  engulf  us. 

On  the  other  hand,  how  honor  the  mystic  who  should 
shut  his  ears  to  the  cry  of  the  oppressed  in  a  modern 
city,  and  dedicate  himself  to  the  pursuit  of  a  meta- 
physical ideal  or  to  the  solitary  Practice  of  the  Presence 
of  a  heartless  God  ?  St.  Teresa  is  organizing  settle- 
ments instead  of  convents ;  St.  Catherine  of  Genoa  is 
head  of  a  training  school  for  nurses,  which  leaves  her 
little  leisure  for  ecstasies  of  "  Pure  Love."  If  by  mate- 
rialism is  meant  a  troubled  preoccupation  with  bodily 
and  social  needs,  the  situation  forces  it  on  us  all. 

II 

It  is  surely  wise  to  speak  out  frankly.  Were  we 
permitted  to  read  the  secrets  of  that  vast  psychical 
activity  which  is  coextensive  with  history,  we  should 
not  be  surprised  to  find  that  religion  in  the  sense  of 
direct  experience  by  the  spirit  of  man  of  the  Spirit  of 
God  has  been  fainter  during  the  last  two  centuries 
than  at  any  preceding  time  in  Christian  story.  If  we 
may  trust  the  records  of  the  inner  life,  an  immediate 
consciousness  of  God — let  us  use  the  great  term  in 
all  simplicity  —  was  far  more  common  in  the  twelfth, 
thirteenth,  or  seventeenth  century  than  it  is  to-day. 

Such  a  statement  must  of  course  be  hazarded  with 
318 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


full  knowledge  of  its  unverifiable  nature.  But  even 
very  devout  people  who  live  much  in  prayer  now  ha- 
bitually confess  with  sorrow  that  this  consciousness  is 
rarely  attained.  The  sense  of  loss  so  common  among 
the  Victorians  pointed  to  a  real  desolation :  — 

He  is  not  risen,  no  ! 
He  lies  and  moulders  low  ! 
Christ  is  not  risen  ! 

For  one  who  expressed,  many  must  have  felt,  many 
continue  to  feel,  this  hidden  tragedy.  "  Doubtless  thou 
art  a  God  that  hidest  thyself,"  is  the  deep  cry  of  the  age. 
This  prevalent  blindness  and  blankness  has  been 
assigned  to  various  causes.  Is  it  fantastic  to  ascribe  it 
in  part  to  the  miasma  that'  rises  from  the  industrial 
condition  of  the  masses,  crushed  and  stifled  under  the 
brutalizing  influences  of  the  competitive  system  ?  Re- 
ligion, with  all  its  privacy,  is  not  only  the  most  per- 
sonal but  the  most  social  of  phenomena  ,  the  spiritual 
atmosphere  is  as  all-pervading  as  the  physical,  and  is 
equally  sensitive  to  social  pollution.  The  spiritual  ex- 
halations of  our  vulgar  and  cruel  democracy  have  ac- 
curately corresponded  to  the  physical,  and  are  equally 
noxious.  Where  there  is  keen  economic  distress,  re- 
ligion is  always  overclouded.  Some  men  will  be 
drawn  to  sheer  revolt,  others  dominated  by  physical 
depletion.  Others  still,  including  the  best,  will  find  an 
all-engrossing  religion  in  the  service  of  the  sick  and 
sorry.  But  between  all  men  and  the  heavens  will  rise 
a  dim  and  vaporous  pall,  impalpably  thin,  impene- 
trably dusked,  like  the  veil  of  smoke  belched  forth  by 

319 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

the  myriad  chimneys  of  a  manufacturing  town.  To  be 
sure,  the  stars  can  be  discerned  through  the  murk. 
Even  the  dweller  in  a  modern  city  may  rejoice  in  the 
ceaseless  pageant  of  day  and  night  that  silently  en- 
velops our  shrieking  human  activities.  But  let  him 
escape  from  the  town  and  rest  on  some  low  headland, 
over  the  lapping  waters  of  the  Atlantic,  where  the 
breeze  blows  salt  and  clean,  and  shadows  lie  purple 
on  the  green  shallows  of  the  bay,  where  the  sky  is 
the  real  blue  that  nature  meant,  softened  only  by  low 
lines  of  half-invisible  cloud-pearls  at  the  horizon;  he 
will  rediscover  a  new  heaven  that  will  perhaps  give 
him  a  promise  of  a  new  earth.  It  is  not  in  cities  that 
modern  astronomers  build  their  towers. 

We  modern  folk  are  likely  to  be  increasingly  a 
race  of  city-dwellers  ;  but  good  hopes  are  held  out  to 
us  that  the  cities  of  the  future  may  be  smokeless. 
There  are  equally  valid  reasons  for  believing  that  the 
social  democracy  will  clear  the  spiritual  air. 

The  crisis  in  which  we  find  ourselves  is  inevitable, 
but  it  never  could  last.  The  brief  interval  of  reli- 
gious indifferentism,  covering  a  trifle  over  two  centu- 
ries, draws  to  a  close.  At  its  height  it  was  partial ;  the 
eighteenth  century  produced  a  Wesley  and  a  Law,  and 
the  doubt  of  the  Victorian  age,  as  Chesterton  points 
out,  was  as  faithful  as  its  faith  was  doubtful.  As  the 
twentieth  century  sweeps  us  on  with  one  of  those  ac- 
celerated historic  movements  of  which  the  pace  is  dizzy- 
ing, a  conscious  reaction  awakens,  and  the  quest  after 
the  ultimate  meaning  of  Jife  revives  on  every  hand. 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


Strange  mysticisms,  turning  often  to  the  East,  rise 
and  thrive  where  modern  materialism  is  hottest.  Phi- 
losophy presses  eagerly  on  its  lonely  way  toward  new 
aspects  of  idealism.  "Wild  Religions  I  have  known," 
as  the  college  boys  irreverently  describe  them,  haunt  the 
more  dubious  thoroughfares  of  our  cities,  and  specu- 
lative movements  of  more  dignified  type  bear  witness 
everywhere  to  the  inextinguishable  thirst  of  the  soul. 

If  it  fares  thus  with  our  generation,  what  of  that 
to  come?  Will  spirituality  under  socialism  wane  and 
perish?  Will  a  satisfying  and  passionate  love  of  "the 
very  skin  and  surface  of  this  fair  earth  on  which  we 
dwell,"  as  William  Morris  puts  it,  replace  all  longing 
for  a  better  country,  in  those  fortunate  citizens  of  the 
future  to  whom  the  world  shall  be  indeed  the  "  Alma 
Parens  "  of  our  dreams  ? 

One  foresees  subtle  perils,  old  temptations  endued 
with  new  power.  When  the  whips  and  scorpions 
which  have  driven  man  God-ward  through  the  ages 
—  Want,  Fear,  Slavery  —  cease  their  cruel  work,  it 
may  well  be  that  he  will  be  tempted  to  abide  no  longer 
as  a  pilgrim  but  as  a  lord,  feasting  fat  and  full,  and 
joyous  in  the  present  till  the  Eternal  fade  from  his 
earth-bound  vision. 

But  ever -sharper  temptation  is  the  measure  of 
growth ;  for  religion,  as  for  ethics,  socialism  means,  not 
achievement  but  opportunity.  The  firm  disciplines 
which  will  press  on  every  one  in  the  socialized  com- 
munity may  not  in  themselves  tend  to  heavenly- 
mindedness ;  but  they  must  develop  such  qualities  of 

321 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

self  -  subordination  and  such  regulated  capacity  as 
should  form  an  excellent  preliminary  to  the  graces 
and  activities  of  the  soul.  The  emphasis  on  practical 
helpfulness  and  charity  which,  however  right,  now 
distracts  men  from  more  religious  aspirations,  will  fall 
into  its  true  secondary  place ;  and  the  race  we  seek  to 
create,  heirs  of  liberty  social  rather  than  individual- 
istic, freemen  because  bound  in  ordered  service,  should 
possess  powers  in  advance  of  our  own  and  preempted 
no  longer  by  lower  needs.  In  a  world  where  that  com- 
mand of  the  Master  to  take  no  thought  for  the  mor- 
row, which  is  so  irritating  to-day,  could  be  literally  fol- 
lowed, the  soul  could  mightily  expand.  The  churches 
would  be  free  from  that  ignominious  duty  to  serve 
tables  which  they  can  escape  to-day  only  by  denying 
their  Lord  ;  the  philosophers  would  breathe  a  clearer 
air ;  and  the  whole  sullen  fog-bank  which  blocks  our 
vision  might  roll  triumphantly  away. 

In  that  good  future  the  interest  in  theology,  one- 
time queen  of  arts  and  sciences,  would  probably  be 
renewed  ;  and  plain  men  and  women  might  bend 
themselves  to  ardent  study  of  the  Great  Mysteries. 
For  even  to  our  mortality  converse  is  not  forbidden 
with  the  things  that,  being  unseen,  abide.  Beatrice 
again  will  take  her  rightful  place,  long  usurped  by 
Matilda ;  and  gazing  into  her  eyes  we  may  see  as 
Dante  saw  the  Image  of  the  Most  High.  If  there  be  a 
God,  the  socialized  community  should  give  Him  a  better 
opportunity  than  the  western  world  has  ever  afforded 
Him  before  to  draw  men's  hearts  to  Himself. 

322 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


III 

The  path  on  which  society  is  impelled  is  always 
the  resultant  of  complex  forces ;  no  one  who  isolates 
a  single  phenomenon,  even  so  great  as  socialism,  can 
rightly  apprehend  its  direction.  Intelligently  to  in- 
quire into  the  reaction  of  the  rising  social  democracy 
on  religion,  we  must  view  the  situation  of  the  west- 
ern world  as  a  whole.  If  we  do  so,  we  find  two 
other  phenomena,  equal  in  dramatic  quality  to  the 
impending  economic  change.  One  is  the  advance  of 
western  science,  the  other  the  influence  of  eastern 
thought. 

As  science  advances,  its  temper  changes.  Sixty  years 
ago  it  was,  to  the  popular  mind,  indorsing  material- 
ism ;  to-day,  it  is  enhancing  mysticism.  We  may  ven- 
ture to  say  that  the  theological  dogmatizing  of  our 
grandfathers  was  no  farther  from  our  more  generous 
religion  than  the  instinctive  skepticisms  of  nineteenth- 
century  science  were  from  the  reverent  expectancy  of 
science  to-day.  Meantime,  the  treasures  of  the  Orient 
and  of  the  Occident  are  blending.  Eacial  immobility 
is  at  an  end.  The  East  opens  her  arms,  perforce  or 
no,  to  the  eager  onrush  of  the  "West,  and,  while  she 
zealously  studies  our  scientific  acquirements  and  tries 
to  adopt  our  methods,  we,  on  our  side,  begin  to  medi- 
tate in  amazed  humility  upon  that  ancient  philosophic 
wisdom  which  she  has  preserved  intact. 

The  rising  passion  for  social  reconstruction,  the 
advance  of  science,  the  new  fellowship  between  East 

323 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

and  West,  —  is  it  by  accident  that  these  three  forces 
are  at  play  on  western  civilization  at  the  same  time  ? 
It  seems  more  likely  that  the  future  will  discern 
among  the  three  some  necessary  relation.  Sixteenth- 
century  scholars  absorbed  in  Greek  manuscripts  were 
probably  not  over-much  concerned  with  the  reports  of 
adventurers  from  far  untraversed  lands ;  nor  were  men 
of  either  type  necessarily  excited  over  the  struggle  for 
religious  freedom  in  Germany.  Yet  scholar,  discov- 
erer, reformer,  were  parts  of  one  movement  of  expan- 
sion, and  we  see  to-day  how  the  revival  of  letters 
combined  with  the  new  geography,  and  with  the  Re- 
formation, to  produce  that  bright  new  civilization  be- 
fore which  feudalism  fled  like  a  vanishing  cloud. 

The  relations  between  western  science  and  eastern 
philosophy  are  stirring  the  East  to  the  depths  and  be- 
gin to  impress  the  West  as  well.  The  relations  between 
science  and  socialism  are  fundamental  and  evident ;  we 
have  already  dwelt  upon  them.  That  there  is  also  a 
relation  between  the  thirsty  gaze  which  men  begin  to 
turn  to  the  founts  of  eastern  wisdom  and  their  craving 
for  social  reconstruction  is  seldom  stressed ;  yet  this 
too  if  we  are  wise  we  must  begin  to  discern.  For  it 
cannot  be  without  meaning  that  the  western  world, 
even  while  it  suffers  the  birth-pangs  of  the  new  cooper- 
ative order,  begins  to  realize  for  the  first  time  the  spir- 
itual treasures  harbored  by  civilizations  which  through 
long  ages  we  have  despised. 

The  East  bowed  low  before  the  blast 
In  patient,  deep  disdain  : 

324 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


She  let  the  legions  thunder  past, 
And  plunged  in  thought  again  — 

not  alone  for  her  own  sake,  surely.  In  the  great  Pro- 
vidence that  rules  the  destinies  of  the  peoples  East 
and  West  are  meeting  at  the  exact  moment  when  the 
vista  opens  of  a  society  gradually  evolving  so  high 
a  degree  of  industrial  peace  and  social  justice  that 
spirit  may  seek  for  Spirit,  driven  back  no  longer  on 
pressing  anxieties  or  clamorous  compassions. 

The  great  gift  of  the  Orient  is  an  ever-present  sense 
of  the  Eternal.  The  heyday  of  competition,  intoxicated 
with  its  own  unlovely  successes,  would  have  scouted 
this  gift  as  absurd.  In  a  community  in  which  material 
production,  being  socially  organized,  no  longer  absorbs 
attention,  its  influence  may  well  be  healthful,  perti- 
nent, and  deep.  We  can  easily  imagine  the  religious 
historians  of  the  socialist  state  noting  with  delight  the 
special  preparation  of  the  West,  by  drastic  changes 
in  the  social  order,  to  receive  what  the  more  contem- 
plative races  have  to  offer. 

Does  some  ingenious  person  threaten  us  at  this 
point  with  the  danger  of  sinking  like  the  Orient  into 
an  ageless  dream?  It  is  amusing  to  picture  Europe 
and  the  United  States  in  this  connection !  We  may 
trust  to  the  very  temperament  of  the  West,  to  the 
growing  call  of  the  adventures  of  science,  to  the  unre- 
laxing  industrial  disciplines  of  the  socialist  state,  for 
our  protection.  Indeed,  the  passion  of  the  new  society 
for  activity  and  efficient  achievement  is  likely  enough 
to  need  supplementing.  What  social  order  has  ever 

325 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

yet  offered  equal  incentive  to  vigorous  interest  in  the 
phenomenal  world  and  ardent  search  for  the  reality 
behind  phenomena?  Noble  action  and  noble  contem- 
plation have  seldom  indeed  flourished  together.  Yet 
both  are  essential  to  fullness  of  life.  In  the  thoughtful 
words  of  Baron  von  Hugel : 1  "  The  movement  of  the 
Christian  life  is  not  a  circle  round  a  single  centre, — 
detachment,  —  but  an  ellipse  round  two  centres,  de- 
tachment and  attachment.  And  precisely  in  the  difficult 
but  immensely  fruitful  oscillation  and  rhythm  between 
the  two  poles  of  spiritual  life,  in  this  fleeing  and  seek- 
ing, and  not  in  either  of  these  two  movements  taken 
alone,  consists  the  completeness  and  culmination  of 
Christianity."  And,  we  may  add,  of  religion.  We 
have  good  reason  to  hope  that  the  new  society  will 
offer  the  most  favorable  conditions  yet  found  for  this 
"fruitful  oscillation."  The  socialist  state,  intent  on 
far-sighted  organization  of  the  greater  industries,  and 
on  conquest  of  the  material  resources  of  the  globe,  is 
not  likely  to  weaken  in  that  "  attachment "  which  has 
always  marked  civilization  in  the  West ;  yet  we  have 
dared  to  predict  that  the  release  from  nervous  strain,  and 
the  tranquillity  that  it  should  insure,  may  foster  the  cor- 
relative increase  of  those  powers  of  detachment  which 
have  been  the  specialty  of  mystics  in  those  ancient  lands 
where  the  spirit  gazes,  more  fixedly  than  we  are  wont 
to  do,  on  the  countenance  of  Truth.  Under  these  cir- 
cumstances no  one  can  calculate  the  depth  and  worth 
that  may  accrue  to  the  influences  of  the  East.  To 
1  The  Mystical  Element  in  Religion. 
326 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


these  influences  we  well  may  look  to  complete  the  proc- 
ess of  counteracting  that  new  hedonism,  that  acqui- 
escence in  a  natural  life  all  too  pleasant  to  lure  the 
spirit  on,  which  we  have  predicted  as  the  special  peril 
of  a  social  democracy. 

A  cooperative  society,  gaining  a  continually  greater 
insight  into  natural  law  and  greater  control  over  natu- 
ral forces,  while  at  the  same  time  it  is  free  from  racial 
or  national  provincialism  and  is  open  to  influences 
from  all  quarters  of  the  globe ;  here,  then,  is  the  stage 
on  which  the  spiritual  drama  of  the  future  must  be 
played.  ;  - 

IV 

What  types  of  religious  life  are  likely  to  obtain 
upon  this  stage  ? 

To  English  readers,  at  least,  the  question  presents 
itself  under  three  aspects :  the  future  of  religion  at 
large ;  the  probable  future  of  Christianity ;  and  the 
possible  fate  of  the  forms  of  Christianity,  in  particular 
of  the  two  great  divisions,  Protestantism  and  Cathol- 
icism. To  be  of  any  value  the  discussion  must  be 
frankly  personal.  One  can  only  present  these  matters 
from  his  own  angle  of  vision,  basing  his  answers  care- 
fully on  his  perception  of  the  new  spiritual  life  already 
pushing  its  restless  way  toward  the  light,  no  less  than 
on  forecasts  of  growth  in  the  new  order. 

The  larger  religious  future  is  inevitably  bound  up 
with  certain  primary  questions.  Will  religion  be  a 
matter  of  dogma,  or  of  intuition  and  unformulated 

327 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

sentiment?  Will  it  hold  to  its  belief  in  a  personal 
God?  What  will  be  its  attitude  toward  death  and 
immortality  ? 

The  present  reaction  against  dogma  is  a  very  com- 
plex affair.  Our  widespread  distaste  is  determined  some- 
what by  our  pleasure  in  escape  from  bigotry,  somewhat 
by  a  genuine  broadening  of  sympathies  and  a  quick- 
ened perception  of  the  relative  nature  of  religious 
formulae.  But  with  these  healthy  and  right  instincts 
blend  others  which  might  inspire  us  with  less  com- 
placency. A  certain  haziness  and  laziness  in  thinking 
has  been  the  natural  concomitant  of  that  deep  and 
subtle  materializing  of  our  inner  life  consequent  on 
our  commercial  civilization.  The  blight  that  has  rested 
on  the  general  religious  consciousness  during  the  mod- 
ern epoch  may  be,  at  least  in  part,  responsible  for  the 
reluctance  of  people  to  adhere  with  any  ardor  to  old 
creeds  or  to  evolve  new  ones.  For,  after  all,  religious 
dogma  only  represents  man  thinking,  and  thinking 
on  those  high  themes  concerning  which  indifference  is 
unnatural.  His  thoughts  have  not  been  tedious  or 
puerile  or  empty;  they  have  been  noble,  lofty,  and 
profound.  If  it  is  unfortunate  to  cling  to  one's  thought 
on  Unseen  Mysteries  and  our  relation  to  them  as  final, 
it  is  more  unfortunate  to  refuse  to  think  at  all.  Victo- 
rian agnosticism  only  too  often  masked  its  indolence  or 
discouragement  as  reverence,  and  expressed  simply  an 
intellectual  cowardice  where  it  thought  to  achieve  a 
philosophic  depth.  The  dogmatizing  ages  were  great 
and  glorious  ages  in  the  history  of  the  mind.  We  may 

328 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


hope  to  have  escaped  permanently  the  evil  by-products 
of  their  ardors,  —  religious  persecutions  and  spiritual 
arrogance ;  but  in  times  of  greater  intellectual  leisure 
and  freedom  it  is  quite  probable,  as  we  have  already 
suggested,  that,  while  retaining  the  precious  heritage 
of  broad  sympathies  which  the  closing  age  bequeaths, 
we  may  also  revive  that  passion  for  high  spiritual  ad- 
venture, that  audacious  yet  worshipful  endeavor  to 
translate  the  elusive  experiences  of  the  spirit  into  terms 
that  shall  fix  them  as  social  possessions,  which  marked 
the  great  ages  of  faith  and  of  the  creeds. 

Will  these  creeds  be  the  old  creeds,  rediscovered, 
reasserted  ?  Will  they  be  new  ones,  inconceivable  to 
us  at  present  ?  Such  questions  no  one  can  answer.  We 
notice  on  the  one  hand  in  most  modern  religious 
movements,  Catholic  and  Protestant,  the  striking  em- 
phasis on  the  instinct  of  continuity.  Iconoclasm  is  no 
longer  valued  for  its  own  sake ;  the  escape  from  old 
shackles  intoxicates  no  more.  It  is  safe  to  predict  that 
reverence  for  tradition  will  continue  to  increase,  and 
that  the  creeds  of  the  future  will  bear  an  organic  re- 
lation to  those  of  the  past.  Yet  while  the  religious  con-  v 
sciousness  is,  in  one  sense,  permanent,  it  is,  in  another, 
constantly  progressive.  To  press  on  bravely,  rever- 
ently, seeking  to  reconcile  loyalty  with  courage,  in  the 
new  reaches  of  life  that  await  us,  is  a  duty  arduous 
enough  to  preserve  the  future  race  from  complacency, 
and  to  stimulate  that  ceaseless  labor  of  the  mind  which 
is  at  once  agony  and  life. 

One  guiding  principle  is   plain.   Thought  is  con-, 
329 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

strained  to-day,  whether  it  will  or  no,  to  place  new 
emphasis  on  the  human  side  of  religious  evolution,  and 
to  perceive  the  large  measure  of  control  exercised  by 
social  and  economic  conditions  over  religious  formula. 
Disinterested  scholarship  has  no  more  vital  task  be- 
fore it  than  to  analyze  and  follow  this  control.  To  call 
faith  the  mirror  of  life  would  be  inaccurate ;  but  at 
least  that  far  glory  on  which  the  eyes  of  faith  are  ever 
fixed  is  seen  by  men  through  the  life  they  share  and 
of  which  they  are  the  product.  The  time  has  come  for 
even  the  most  orthodox  to  accept  this  point  of  view 
boldly,  and  to  recognize  that,  whatever  happens  to 
formula,  concepts  change  from  age  to  age,  such  change 
being  largely  though  obscurely  determined  by  the  char- 
acteristics of  the  social  structure.  Now  humanity  has 
never  yet  realized  itself  as  a  social  democracy,  and  we 
may  be  sure  that  whatever  may  be  the  fate  of  reli- 
gion in  the  socialist  state  new  experiences  are  await- 
ing it. 

In  thus  acknowledging  the  power  of  social  institu- 
tions to  control  if  not  to  generate  religious  ideas,  we 
must  not  be  thought  necessarily  to  imply  a  purely 
human  origin  for  religion.  Religion  itself  is  not  born 
from  below,  but  from  above.  Of  this  that  ultimate 
criterion  of  knowledge,  the  experience  of  the  race,  as- 
sures us  even  more  clearly  than  metaphysical  inquiries. 
All  positive  definitions  and  intuitions  of  spiritual  truth 
have  pointed  to  a  great  Reality.  This  confidence  pro- 
tects and  reassures  us  in  days  when  thoughts  of  process 
too  often  overpower  those  of  ultimate  origin.  Formula 

330 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


alter,  theologies  change,  determined  largely  by  the 
phases  of  social  growth ;  yet  they  are  all  alike  attempts, 
not  to  give  a  body  to  illusion,  but  to  portray  experi- 
enced fact.  Once  assured  of  this,  the  soul  can  rest 
secure,  however  winds  may  strain  and  waves  may  rage. 
Keligion  has  from  the  first  been  no  mere  translation 
of  desire  into  metaphor;  it  has  been  the  progressive 
effort,  less  crude  as  the  generations  pass,  to  describe  ex- 
perience. This  experience  deepens  and  widens  through 
the  ages,  and  formulae  slowly  follow  it,  but  the  "  God, 
Creation's  secret  Force,"  is  forever  "Himself  Un- 
moved, all  motion's  Source,"  and  through  all  groping 
and  temporary  obscuration  we  move  ever  nearer  to  the 
Uncreated  Light. 


A  profound  religious  transformation  must  then  ac- 
company every  social  transformation.  Nowhere  is  this 
law  more  evident  than  in  regard  to  the  greatest  of  all 
objects  of  human  thought,  the  concept  of  Deity.  We 
see  with  increasing  clearness  that  the  great  word, 
"  God,"  greatest  that  mankind  has  ever  uttered,  con- 
notes a  different  concept  in  every  age.  The  God  of 
nomadic  tribes  is  a  tribal  chieftain.  The  God  of  feu- 
dalism, as  imaged  in  the  superb  mosaic  that  overlooks 
ruined  Messina  from  the  fallen  glory  of  its  shrine,  is 
a  masterful  feudal  overlord.  That  this  conception  of 
ultimate  being  will  be  deeply  if  subtly  affected  by  the 
social  forms  of  the  future,  till  it  assumes  a  character 
which  we  can  only  dimly  predict,  is  indubitable.  How, 

331 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

then,  are  men  likely  to  think  of  God  in  the  socialist 
state?  Shall  we  be  able  still  to  use  the  dear  forms  and 
emotions  of  childhood?  May  we  retain  the  idea  of 
Personality  as  an  attribute  of  the  Informing  Spirit 
of  the  world  ? 

No  question  is  more  crucial,  none  more  unanswer- 
able. Yet  we  may  gain  pregnant  hints  from  the  life 
we  know.  For  democracy  is  already  affecting  as  deeply 
as  it  is  unconsciously  the  general  conception  of  God. 
Looking  within,  we  are  aware  that  to  us  the  Final 
Reality  that  controls  the  secret  thought  is  no  distant 
Monarch,  the  natural  ruler  of  a  world  aristocratically 
organized,  but  a  pervading  Spirit,  so  manifest  in  the 
life  of  nature  and  the  social  whole  that  it  is  easy  to 
confuse  Him  with  that  very  world  which  He  inspires. 
Immanential  rather  than  transcendental  ideas  of  Deity 
have  proved  the  natural  product  of  modern  life.  They 
rose  unmistakably  coincident  with  the  rise  of  demo- 
cratic feeling,  its  earliest  correlative  and  its  crowning 
glory,  overpowering  formal  creeds  in  the  mind  even  of 
so  orthodox  a  poet  as  Wordsworth,  and  supplementing 
all  other  religious  conceptions  for  a  Shelley  or  a  Rous- 
seau ;  and  they  are  rising  still  to  ever  greater  domi- 
nance. 

Now,  socialism  is  simply  democracy  coming  to  its 
own.  If,  even  in  the  present  individualistic  chaos,  de- 
spite the  picture  of  scrambling  egotism  which  it  pre- 
sents, the  intuition  of  the  Immanent  God  keeps  pace 
with  the  growth  of  feeling  for  the  social  whole,  we 
must  believe  that  this  intuition  will  prevail  increas- 

332 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


ingly,  as  such  growth  goes  on  and  develops  an  organic 
harmony  in  which  the  reflection  and  working  of  a  Divine 
Life  are  more  easily  to  be  perceived.  Already,  more- 
over, immanential  ideas  are,  as  we  have  seen,  empha- 
sized by  the  influx  of  pantheistic  influences  from  the 
East,  and  by  the  recent  suggestions  of  science.  Realiz- 
ing how  deeply  the  society  to  be  may  be  penetrated  by 
these  influences,  and  how  native  the  intuition  of  im- 
manence may  be  to  it  even  superficially,  we  may  safely 
predict  that  a  vital,  illuminating,  and  sustaining  mode 
of  thought  among  the  devoutly  disposed  in  the  social- 
ist state,  will  be  an  intensified  form  of  the  modern 
faith  in  a  God  revealed  through  His  universe  rather 
than  apart  from  it,  and  manifested  in  ail  that  we  in 
our  ignorance  call  impersonal,  as  well  as  in  human 
consciousness  and  after  the  fashion  of  a  man. 

Yet  we  must  beware  of  thinking  that  this  is  the 
whole  stor^r.  The  conception  of  a  God  "  sustaining  the 
world  by  the  immanence  of  His  Will  "/is  certain  to 
grow  clearer :  it  would  be  rash  to  assert  that  the  other 
conception  of  One  who  "  transcends  the  world  in  the 
glory  of  His  Being  "  1  will  necessarily  fade  away.  For 
we  cannot  question  that  in  modern  society  the  sense 
of  personality  is  constantly  growing  more  acute.  De- 
mocracy from  its  birth  had  ja  marvelous  perception  of 
the  glory  and  significance  of  the  individual ;  this  per- 
ception js  starting-point  and  foundation  of  that  collec- 
tive ideal  which  is  coming  to  dominate  our  thought.  We 
remember  how  at  the  outset  of  the  democratic  perioi" 
1  Hibbert  Journal.  « 

333 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  KELIGION 

the  piercing  accents  of  Blake,  summing  up  all  that 
the  most  daring  anthropomorphism  could  express,  left 
us  breathless :  — 

Thou  art  a  man  :  God  is  no  more  : 
Thine  own  humanity  learn  to  adore. 

From  Emerson  to  Browning  the  lesson  has  been  re- 
echoed in  exaltation.  And  as  democracy  develops,  this 
feeling  for  the  miracle  of  personality  is  likely  to  deepen. 
If  socialism,  by  enhancing  the  common  consciousness 
and  emphasizing  collective  action,  withdraws,  as  it  well 
may  do,  some  props  round  which  the  separatist  ideal  of 
life  has  twined,  it  may,  none  the  less,  if  only  from  the 
fact  that  it  will  mark  the  highest  stage  yet  of  social 
evolution,  teach  us  to  value  and  experience  the  mystery 
of  our  own  personal  being  as  never  before.  The  larger 
freedom  for  individual  development  toward  which  we 
look  when  our  brutalizing  conditions  shall  have  yielded 
to  a  more  generous  fostering  of  human  aptitudes,  will 
inevitably  bring  with  it  a  growing  delight  in  that  ulti- 
mate marvel  of  character  which  is,  so  far  as  we  know, 
the  last  triumph,  as  it  is  the  last  mystery,  of  the  uni- 
verse. However  much  farther  the  analysis  of  multiple 
personality  may  be  carried,  the  man  must  always  remain 
one,  and  finally  the  only,  actor  in  his  own  inner  world. 
Self-consciousness,  which  has  become  infinitely  deeper 
and  more  intricate  since  the  days  of  Homer,  will  become 
continually  more  intense  and  subtle  :  known  by  each 
man  in  himself,  inferred  by  him  in  others,  it  may  re- 
main while  he  lives,  if  not  when  he  thinks,  the  surest 
fact  on  his  horizon.  Now,  no  matter  what  wide  reaches 

334 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


of  unsounded  being  alien  or  akin  to  his  own  man  may 
dimly  discern  in  the  Infinite,  he  can  never  exclude  from 
that  Infinite  the  highest  and  surest  mode  of  existence 
that  he  knows.  Still  spirit  will  seek  to  meet  with  Spirit ; 
and,  after  all,  to  protect  the  possibility  of  that  meet- 
ing was  all  which  the  theologians  ever  meant  with 
their  insistence  on  the  much-battered,  largely  misun- 
derstood, highly  unsatisfactory,  and  wholly  indispen- 
sable term,  a  personal  God. 

That  the  very  conception  of  personality,  whether 
human  or  divine,  is,  however,  to  be  immensely  enlarged 
and  enriched,  partly  through  the  advance  of  psychology, 
partly  through  a.  widening  social  experience,  partly 
through  new  insight  into  the  spiritual  life  of  nature,  we 
cannot  doubt.  Not  without  meaning  is  symbol  the  syn- 
onym for  creed.  The  symbol  for  Infinite  Reality  cher- 
ished by  the  cooperative  commonwealth  must  contain  a 
wider  majesty  than  is  known  to-day.  We  are  not  likely 
to  apprehend  God  more  intensely  than  the  psalmist  or 
St.  Augustine  ;  in  dwelling  on  the  evolutionary  aspects 
of  religion  we  must  not  forget  that  it  is  in  one  sense  the 
most  static  of  phenomena,  enabling  us  more  than  aught 
else  in  history  to  measure  our  own  littleness  and  the 
slowness  of  our  advance.  But  though  we  may  not  feel 
more  intensely,  that  which  we  feel  will  be  more  in  ac- 
cordance with  the  depths  of  the  riches  of  the  unsearch- 
able Being  of  God.  Forms  of  religious  thought  are  the 
final  test  of  every  civilization ;  in  the  new  society,  the 
Voice  of  the  Beloved,  speaking  to  the  disciple  as  it 
has  spoken  from  the  beginning,  may  rise  from  regions 

335 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

of  consciousness  before  unsounded,  and  echo  from  a 
range  of  experience  coextensive  with  a  universe  ever 
more  holy  because  ever  more  alive. 

Those  social  conceptions  which  are  already  so  inti- 
mately affecting  the  springs  of  thought  must,  when  per- 
fected, lead  to  religious  conceptions  in  which  ideas  of 
transcendence  and  immanence  may  be  at  least  partially 
fused,  and  which  will  be  as  far  removed  from  the  empty 
monotheism  of  the  eighteenth  century  or  the  lower 
ranges  of  Unitarianism  as  from  the  crass  tri theism  of 
current  orthodoxy.  Orient  and  Occident  will  contribute 
to  the  idea.  The  God  of  the  East  is  perceived  from  the 
vast  silences  of  nature  ;  the  God  of  the.  future  democracy 
must  rather  be  the  God  of  them  that  dwell  in  cities.  Yet 
if  we  are  really  to  build  "  in  England's  green  and  pleas- 
ant land  "  a  nearer  image  than  heretofore  of  the  "  Ci- 
vitas  Dei,"  it  may  well  be  that  the  heavens  and  He  that 
dwelleth  therein  shall  be  as  well  discerned  from  its 
streets  thronged  with  comrades  as  from  the  lonely  sweep 
of  the  desert  or  the  peaks  of  farthest  Himalay.  Of  one 
thing  we  may  be  sure ;  no  ideal  that,  bearing  the  test 
of  time  and  social  change,  has  proved  permanently  life- 
giving  will  ever  be  discarded  from  religious  concepts. 
And  among  such  ideals  we  must  give  first  rank  to 
faith  in  a  God  who  forever  assures  His  creatures  that 
before  they  call  He  will  answer,  and  while  they  are 
yet  speaking  He  will  hear. 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


VI 

Let  us  pause  for  a  moment  only  over  the  probable 
attitude  of  our  socialized  community  toward  death  and 
immortality. 

One  sometimes  hears  it  said  with  a  little  sneer  that 
the  desire  for  eternal  life  is  selfish ;  but  this  curious 
fallacy  may  be  dismissed  with  a  word.  It  is  as  possible 
to  crave  paradise  for  other  people  as  to  crave  anything 
else  for  them.  In  the  ages  of  individualism,  immor- 
tality was  individualistically  conceived, — as  current 
hymnody  bears  abundant  witness.  In  social  ages,  it 
can  be  conceived  in  a  purely  social  way.  The  egotist 
or  the  craven  may  still  whine  selfishly  for  a  lazy  heaven, 
in  which  he  pictures  himself  basking  as  the  special  pet 
of  the  Higher  Powers ;  but  the  man  of  broad  sym- 
pathies will  aspire  toward  a  future  in  which,  not  only 
his  own  failures  may  be  retrieved,  but  all  the  unful- 
filled beginnings  which  he  sees  on  every  hand  may 
sweep  onward  into  fulfillment.  The  loss  of  hope  for 
a  time  when  tears  shall  be  wiped  away  from  all  eyes 
that  mourn  would  be  in  some  ways  a  greater  tragedy 
to  one  who  here  knows  full  meed  of  personal  joy, 
mingled  with  the  constant  anguish  of  social  compunc- 
tion, than  it  could  be  even  to  the  starved  and  sorrow- 
ful. We  shall  never  again  tolerate  the  injustice  and 
oppression  of  earth  in  the  tranquil  expectation  of  celes- 
tial reprisals :  our  philosophy  and  our  instincts  are  too 
deeply  penetrated  by  the  perception  that  the  Eternal 
is  here  and  now,  as  well  as  hereafter.  But  to  take 

337 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

away  the  faith  in  immortality,  to  assert  that  the  an- 
guish of  the  generations  since  the  birth  of  time  has 
passed  unretrieved,  and  that  the  drama  of  individual 
lives  ends  abruptly  unfinished  in  the  impasse  of  death, 
is  for  many  of  us  to  knock  the  very  bottom  out  of 
optimism  and  to  replace  the  heart  by  a  stone. 

Yet  of  course  one  foresees  men  divided  into  differ- 
ent groups  as  regards  their  attitude  toward  the  great 
Mystery.  As  life  grows  sweeter,  and  this  world  more 
dear,  horror  of  departure  may  be  intensified,  and 
Death  play  with  new  poignancy  his  role  as  King  of 
Terrors.  Modern  theories,  however,  if  verified,  offer 
help  and  consolation.  For  longevity  may  be  prolonged 
till  the  signal  to  depart  is  grateful.  When  the  term  of 
natural  life,  which  we  are  told  is  now  never  reached, 
shall  be  generally  attained,  cessation  may  be  as  gentle 
as  the  fall  of  the  leaf,  as  much  desired  as  sleep  after  a 
long  and  joyous  day. 

Yet  how  imagine  men  incurious  concerning  the 
awakening  ?  Surely  no  development  or  refinement  of 
resources  can  ever  make  this  world  other  than  an  inn, 
a  resting-place,  to  the  nobly  tempered  soul.  Many 
motives  interplay  to  create  the  desire  for  immortality. 
Among  these  it  is  quite  conceivable  that  the  mere 
longing  for  physical  continuance,  now  natural  to  a 
healthy  organism,  may  weaken ;  but  revolt  against 
separation  from  loved  ones,  hatred  at  leaving  unfin- 
ished tasks,  and  indeed  the  sheer  dramatic  passion  for 
living,  are  not  likely  to  fade. 

An  impulse  different  from  all  these  is,  however,  at 
338 


SOCIALISM  AND  THEISM 


the  heart  of  the  craving  for  immortality.  This  is  the 
desire  of  the  God-intoxicated  for  the  unveiled  vision 
of  Him  seen  darkly  here  through  the  glass  of  nature 
and  humanity,  but  there,  if  the  Apostle  be  trusted, 
face  to  face. 

It  is  strange  and  startling  to  note  how  currently 
the  craving  for  a  life  to  come  is  discussed  to-day  apart 
from  any  question  of  faith  in  God.  Even  so  reverent 
a  thinker  as  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson  speaks  in  his  In- 
gersoll  lecture  as  if  the  desire  that  the  Good  may  be 
strengthened  and  more  knowledge  attained  were  our 
noblest  incentive  to  hope  for  immortality.  But  thought 
of  this  type  can  never  satisfy.  It  follows  the  disastrous 
advice  of  the  Boyg  to  Peer  Gynt,  and  "  goes  round 
about,"  till  the  very  point  and  centre  is  never  reached. 
If  separated  from  interest  in  our  relation  to  a  living 
God,  speculations  concerning  immortality  would  have 
run  a  course  quite  different  from  the  fact.  The  noblest 
Christian  men  and  women  have  always  desired  to  sur- 
vive death  chiefly  that  they  might  see  His  countenance. 
What  are  all  other  desires  compared  to  this  ?  It  is  no 
verbal  invention ;  it  has  been,  to  chosen  spirits,  a  con- 
trolling fact  for  nearly  two  thousand  years.  True,  not 
all  men  experience  it;  but  neither  do  all  men  respond 
to  the  motives  of  Mr.  Lowes  Dickinson.  What  rea- 
son is  there  for  supposing  that  it  will  weaken  as  time 
goes  on? 

No  quickening  intuition  of  the  divine  present  in 
the  natural  order,  no  rise  of  pantheistic  passion,  can 
ever  satisfy  the  longing  for  unhampered  and  perfect 

339 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

fellowship  with  Him  who  was  "before  all  worlds."  As 
Herbert  Spencer  pointed  out,  our  contact  with  un- 
known mystery  constantly  widens  with  the  increase 
of  the  circumference  of  our  knowledge.  The  more  the 
circle  expands,  the  more  will  be  our  need  to  escape 
from  all  relation  to  "the  wheel"  of  phenomena  into 
conscious  union  with  the  Uncreated  and  the  Uncon- 
fined.  The  craving  for  the  beatific  vision  will  never 
die.  If  reincarnations  must  multiply  before  it  be  at- 
tained,— and  this  view  is  sure  to  gain  vogue  as  east- 
ern influences  increase,  —  why,  death  will  be  the  portal 
to  another  stage  in  the  long  pilgrimage.  If  the  older 
Christian  orthodoxies  persist,  death  will  be  the  signal 
for  the  plunge  into  those  purifying  fires  which,  as  be- 
lieved by  Dante,  by  Catherine  of  Genoa,  by  the  Catholic 
world  at  large,  do  darkly  reveal  to  the  soul  the  light 
of  the  countenance  of  God. 

Shrinking  from  death  and  longing  for  death  —  va- 
riously motived,  functioning  on  various  planes  —  will 
then  coexist  in  the  future  as  they  do  to-day.  Specula- 
tions concerning  immortality  may  quite  conceivably 
be  merged  in  a  clearer  knowledge  than  we  now  pos- 
sess ;  but  however  this  may  be,  the  "  Vera  Patria " 
will  always  shed  its  light  from  beyond  the  horizon,  and 
the  dream  of  its  glories  will  continue  to  summon  men 
to  nobler  and  sterner  living  in  the  midst  of  the  allure- 
ments of  a  world  fairer  than  the  one  we  know. 


CHAPTER  II 

SOCIALISM  AND   CHRISTIANITY 


MANY  readers  will  resent  any  effort  to  show  that 
Christian  concepts  will  be  peculiarly  harmonious  with 
the  deeper  needs  of  socialism.  And,  indeed,  the  more 
definite  our  speculations  concerning  the  religious  future 
become,  the  more  rash  they  must  appear.  At  the  same 
time  it  does  us  no  harm  to  remember  that  the  west- 
ern world  which  we  considers  still  currently  known  as 
Christendom :  some  countries  indeed,  like  Italy,  imply 
that  every  man  is  a  Christian  as  matter  of  course,  by 
offering  as  popular  excuse  for  the  ways  of  a  donkey 
the  fact  that  the  poor  beast  "  non  e  cristiano."  And 
we  socialists  do  well  to  reflect  that  our  creed  is,  after 
all,  the  product  of  a  civilization  soaked  in  Christian 
teaching ;  curious  as .  it  may  seem,  the  western  world 
has  always  clung  to  at  least  a  nominal  connection  with 
the  young  Jew  who  lived  obscurely  in  Palestine  close 
on  two  thousand  years  ago. 

All  this  does  not  commit  us  to  Christianity  in  the 
future.  But,  at  least,  the  course  of  our  discussion  has 
made  two  points  clear.  In  the  first  place  it  has  si- 
lenced the  outcry  against  the  religion  of  the  Carpen- 
ter on  the  score  of  its  impracticability.  The  socialist 
Christian  quotes  with  exultation  instead  of  despair 

341 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

the  famous  remark  of  Laveleye,  "  If  Christianity  were 
taught  and  understood  to-day  in  the  spirit  of  its 
Founder,  the  existing  social  organism  could  not  last 
a  day,"  and  finds  in  it  a  strong  argument,  not  only 
for  social  revolution,  but  for  the  vital  force  of  that 
religion  which  has  never  let  go  its  tug  at  the  world's 
heart-strings  even  when  it  has  seemed  to  appeal  from  a 
region  infinitely  removed  from  reality.  And  again,  our 
discussion  has  thrown  into  insignificance  the  sharp  tem- 
porary hostility  between  some  official  forms  of  Christ- 
ianity and  the  socialist  faith.  It  has  shown  us  that  we 
shall  have  a  perfect  right,  in  despite  of  popes  on  the 
one  hand  and  demagogues  on  the  other,  to  hold,  if 
logic  so  lead  us,  that  Christianity,  and  of  a  Catholic 
type  at  that,  is  the  religion  best  suited  to  endure  in  a 
social  democracy. 

It  is  not  uninteresting  to  notice  at  the  outset  that 
the  religion  of  Christ  has  manifested  constantly, 
through  all  social  changes,  new  phases  of  moral  and 
spiritual  power.  Marvelous  in  versatile  adaptability 
has  been  its  course  under  skies  mostly  untoward! 
For  fifteen  hundred  years  European  society  presented 
an  aristocratic  structure  founded  upon  force.  Despite 
its  naturally  democratic  instincts,  Christianity  made 
the  most  of  the  moral  opportunities  offered  by  this 
regime.  It  placed  its  emphasis  on  obedience  to  au- 
thority, religious  and  secular,  and  by  this  means  gave 
the  young  races  the  discipline  essential  to  their  pro- 
gress. At  the  same  time  it  called  its  chosen  to  a  com- 

342 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

plete  withdrawal  from  a  world  it  could  modify  but 
not  subdue,  and  held  up  through  the  great  monastic 
orders  an  uncompromising  standard  of  humility  and 
non-resistance.  Slowly  the  social  situation  changed: 
to  the  Ages  of  Violence  succeeded  the  Age  of  Greed. 
Feudalism  died :  Capitalism  entered  upon  the  scene. 
During  the  period  of  transition  the  Renascence 
brought  with  it,  correlative  to  the  expanse  of  com- 
merce, a  new  passion  for  liberty  and  intellectual  light. 
Christianity  discovers  the  necessity  for  these  things 
on  the  religious  side :  Protestantism  is  born  and  in- 
tellectual courage  and  inward  freedom  become  the 
gifts  which  Christianity  gives  the  changing  order. 
The  last  two  centuries  in  which  industrialism  has 
come  to  its  own  witness  the  gravest  check  yet  experi- 
enced by  the  religious  consciousness.  We  instinctively 
feel  that  the  deliberate  self-seeking  encouraged  as  our 
basal  virtue  is  in  more  dangerous  antagonism  to  the 
teachings  of  Jesus  than  that  plain  acceptance  of  the 
rule  of  the  strongest  which  shaped  mediaeval  society. 
He  rebuked  violence  always  less  severely  than  greed. 
Yet,  during  the  control  of  this  industrial  system,  — 
a  control  from  which  we  hope  that  we  may  soon  es- 
cape,— we  see  the  Christian  temper,  while  tempo- 
rarily powerless  to  overcome  the  evils  and  experienc- 
ing in  consequence  an  ebb  tide  of  spiritual  passion,  at 
least  utilizing  modern  social  misery  and  terror  to  en- 
gender a  resolute  sympathy,  a  devotion  to  social  serv- 
ice, that  are  both  good  in  themselves  and  must  rank 
high  among  the  forces  of  emancipation. 

343 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

In  such  various  ways  has  the  religion  of  Christ 
penetrated  the  heart  and  mind,  wresting  from  the  false 
and  the  imperfect  in  every  stage  of  development  ever 
fresh  means  of  education  and  discipline,  while  with  con- 
stant firmness  it  has  pointed  to  the  ideal  city  where 
the  will  of  its  Lord  shall  be  more  perfectly  manifest. 
If  we  may  judge  from  the  past,  there  is  no  reason  to 
fear  lest  Christianity  fail  in  power  to  adapt  itself  to  a 
new  order,  or  to  furnish  what  correctives  and  stimuli 
such  an  order  may  be  able  to  receive. 

Force  and  greed  die  hard,  nor  does  any  one  expect 
that  they  will  ever  be  eliminated  from  human  nature. 
But  the  civilizations  definitely  founded  on  them  do 
seem  to  be  passing  away.  Armaments  still  absorb  the 
wealth  of  nations  ;  yet,  broadly,  military  organiza- 
tion has  yielded  to  industrial,  and  warfare,  in  the 
West,  is  reduced  more  and  more,  like  the  orthodox 
hell,  to  a  logical  necessity  in  the  background.  Com- 
merce continues  its  Moloch -like  career;  yet  mere 
economy  in  production  begins  to  demand  the  elimi- 
nation of  the  human  and  material  waste  that  it  now 
entails.  The  basis  of  our  discussion  is  the  assumption 
that  a  new  society,  industrial  rather  than  militant,  co- 
operative rather  than  competitive,  is  coming  to  the 
birth,  f  Can  we  expect  that  the  religion  which  has 
shown  so  great  vitality  while  existing  on  sufferance  is 
likely  to  disappear  when  its  ethics  have  permeated  the 
social  structure? 

It  is  hardly  thinkable.  And  yet  people  are  not 
lacking  to  claim  that  the  very  triumph  of  Christian 

344 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHEISTIANITY 

principles  means  that  the  work  of  Christianity  is  done. 
For  these  principles  will  in  the  days  to  come,  they 
claim,  no  longer  need  the  support  of  definite  creeds. 
Christianity  is  fading  out  of  conscious  life  even  as'it 
comes  ethically  to  its  own. 

II 

There  are  grave  reasons  for  supporting  this  posi- 
tion. Apart  from  that  non-Christian  origin  and  anti- 
Christian  animus  of  the  socialist  movement,  with 
which  we  are  so  familiar,  influences  quite  outside  of 
Christianity  are  exerting  an  increasing  power.  An 
immense  amount  of  virtual  paganism  both  underlies 
and  overrides  our  nominal  faith:  Christian  doctrines 
are  apparently  disintegrating,  Christian  conduct  is 
scornfully  neglected,  the  historic  foundations  of 
Christian  belief  are  challenged.  Other  religions,  surg- 
ing in  from  the  East,  some  more  or  less  patronizingly 
allied  to  it,  others  defiantly  separating  themselves  from 
its  terminology,  appeal  clamorously  on  every  hand  ;  and 
a  general  sense  of  upheaval  from  the  depths  renders  the 
solid  surface  of  life,  as  it  were,  insecure  to  our  tread. 
One  fact  is  certain.  Religious  authority  in  the  old  sense 
is  a  vanished  illusion.  Under  its  fostering  care,  as 
given  by  the  Church  Catholic,  mediaeval  Europe  was 
nurtured.  It  has  fought  hard  to  hold  its  own ;  it  has 
ceased  to  exist.  "  I  went  by,  and  lo  !  it  was  gone,  and 
the  place  thereof  shall  know  it  no  more." 

These  are  plausible  and  powerful  considerations. 
But  the  future  holds  its  secrets  well.  One  certitude  is 

345 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

forced  on  us :  it  is  unlikely  that  Christianity  will  re- 
tain so  nominally  exclusive  a  sway  as  it  has  hitherto 
done  in  western  Europe.  In  all  probability,  the  day  of 
its  conventional  social  control  is  passing  and  will  soon 
be  forgotten.  The  time  will  come  when  the  Christian 
faith  will  have  to  fight  for  right  of  way  among  crowd- 
ing antagonists  as  vigorously  as  in  the  times  of  Atha- 
nasius  and  Augustine. 

And  in  thoughts  like  these  all  genuine  Christians 
must  rejoice.  Without  the  call  to  high  adventure, 
the  faith  has  never  flourished.  A  wise  leader  has 
pointed  out  that  Christianity  is  to-day  suffering  from 
diffusion  at  the  cost  of  intensity.  The  believer  draws 
a  deep  breath  of  relief  in  forecasting  a  society  in 
which  it  will  have  lost  all  artificial  prestige,  and  must 
meet  its  rivals  face  to  face  on  fair  terms,  contending 
with  them  in  an  open  field.  What  prospect  could  so 
release  us  from  those  modern  languors  which  debili- 
tate our  souls  ? 

We  may  already  discern  two  chief  attitudes,  which 
may  or  may  not  crystallize  into  systems,  but  which 
will  surely  draw  to  themselves  a  large  proportion  of 
religious  feeling  in  the  social  democracy.  The  first, 
and  perhaps  the  dominant,  will  be  a  new  hedonism, 
strengthened  probably  by  the  revelations  of  science 
and  informed  by  the  mystical  pantheism  for  which 
democratic  forms  of  society  have  a  special  affinity.  A 
Whitman-like  religion  it  will  be,  instinct  with  undis- 
criminating  reverence  for  all  manifestations  of  life, 
crying,  with  William  Blake,  "  Everything  that  lives 

346 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

is  holy,"  and  assigning  to  natural  impulses  a  control- 
ling role.  Iinmanential  ideas  will  entirely  have  super- 
seded transcendental.  Somewhat  checked,  perhaps,  by 
the  social  principles  that  will  demand  protection  for 
the  physical  well-being  of  the  race,  this  attitude  will, 
on  the  whole,  tend  to  obliterate  the  older  moral  cate- 
gories in  favor  of  a  religion  emotional,  tolerant,  more 
or  less  fatalistic,  in  which  the  sympathies  will  be 
strongly  developed  and  the  disciplines  ignored.  Much 
of  the  defiant  feeling  generated  in  the  schools  of  re- 
volt flows  already  into  this  channel.  One  foresees  new 
throngs  of  devout  adherents  in  a  state  where  the 
fiercer  passions  will  be  held  more  in  leash  than  now, 
and  a  generally  diffused  well-being  will  tend  to  re- 
produce in  human  society,  to  a  superficial  view,  the 
non-moral  harmonies  of  nature.  The  faith  may  well 
be  organized,  and  assume  varying  forms,  —  some  crass 
and  crude,  others  exquisitely  alluring.  Various  sects 
will  probably  appear,  some  repudiating  with  distaste 
all  form  and  ceremony,  while  others  develop  a  sump- 
tuous ritual  rich  in  symbolic  rites. 

This  new  hedonism  will  be  the  natural  outcome  of 
the  scheme  of  things,  exhaling  without  effort  from 
the  social  or.der.  By  its  side  there  may  well  arise,  in 
reaction,  more  ascetic  schools,  repudiating  the  life  of 
the  flesh  as  wholly  evil.  Inspired  by  ancient  eastern 
tradition,  and  reinforced,  perhaps,  by  psychical  science, 
these  schools  will  take  advantage  of  the  ever-persistent 
craving  to  work  out  the  perfection  of  the  soul  through 
the  disciplines  of  mortification.  They  will  summon 

347 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

men  swiftly  to  disencumber  themselves  of  all  earthly 
preoccupations  that  their  pilgrimage  to  eternity  may  be 
more  sure. 

These  moods,  not  yet  crystallized,  are  of  course 
even  now  prevalent,  both  within  and  without  the 
Christian  Church.  That  they  have  valuable  elements 
no  one  would  deny.  That  they  are,  when  taken  in 
exclusive  emphasis,  unchristian,  though  for  different 
reasons,  is  equally  clear.  Against  all  such  theories 
Christianity  is  even  now  half  consciously  struggling. 
On  what  grounds  must  she  base  her  future  appeal 
against  these  rivals  of  hers  ? 

To  answer,  we  must  seek  that  in  Christianity  which 
is  distinctive  and  central.  The  Christian  who  finds  his 
own  religion  supremely  life-giving  will  hold  that  all 
which  gives  life  in  any  faith  is  found  in  his  own  creed, 
free  from  over-emphasis.  But  apart  from  this  inclu- 
siveness,  he  must  find  in  the  Christian  formula  some 
permanent  and  unique  norm  or  germ  of  power. 

Ill 

Every  thinker  naturally  makes  his  own  attempt  to 
analyze  and  define  this  essence  of  Christianity.  Loisy, 
Harnack,  Tolstoy,  has  each  his  formula.  Matthew 
Arnold,  a  keen  precursor  of  these  schools,  perhaps 
did  as  well  as  any  when  he  declared  the  essence  of 
Christianity  to  consist  in  the  method  and  secret  of 
Jesus  :  the  method  of  inwardness,  the  secret  of  self- 
renunciation.  Yet  with  all  respect  to  that  lucid  and 
honest  thinker,  how  unsatisfactory  any  such  formulae 

348 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

appear  !  Inwardness,  self -renouncement  —  has  Christ- 
ianity proclaimed  these  more  loudly  than  any  other 
religion  has  done?  More  modern  definitions  on  the 
same  lines  fare  no  better.  Are  we  not  driven  to  feel 
that  the  distinctive  strength  of  a  religion  is  not  found 
in  ethical  suggestions  such  as  these,  sure  to  be  held 
in  common  with  other  faiths  ?  Must  we  not  rather 
find  that  distinctive  strength  in  the  -help  the  religion 
affords  our  whole  thinking  and  feeling  being  to  relate 
itself  to  the  eternal  ?  So  the  great  saints  have  thought ; 
they  ought  to  know  better  than  we.  Looking  at  the 
matter,  not  abstractly,  but  in  the  light  of  Christian 
history,  what  gifts  have  been  judged  most  precious  ? 
What  have  men  defended  with  most  ardent  passion, 
illustrated  in  their  characters  and  lives? 

The  greatest  gift  of  Christianity  to  the  world  is 
the  Image  of  Jesus,  —  that  personality  which,  "  lifted 
up  on  the  Cross,  lifted  up  into  glory,"  draws  all  men 
to  himself.  This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  the  his- 
toric support  for  that  Image,  nor  the  process,  made 
constantly  clearer  by  modern  scholarship,  through 
which  It  came  to  represent  to  the  faithful  all  they 
could  know  of  God,  and  became,  as  It  still  remains, 
central  to  the  obedience  and  the  adoration  of  the 
Christian  world.  But  looking  into  the  life  of  the 
Christian  ages,  we  should  not  be  far  wrong  if  we 
noted  twofold  conceptions  guarding  and  preserving 
that  gift :  on  the  side  of  the  daring  effort  to  reveal 
something  of  the  nature  of  ultimate  reality,  that  start- 
ling, misused,  profoundly  original  hypothesis,  the  doc- 

349 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

trine  of  the  Trinity ;  on  the  safer  side  of  man's  direct 
experience  of  the  divine  working  through  the  human, 
the  doctrines  of  the  Incarnation  and  the  Atonement. 
These  ideas,  of  course,  have  their  parallels  in  other 
religions.  Perhaps  the  distinctive  thing  in  Christian- 
ity is  the  relation  they  bear  to  the  historic  Jesus  ;  at  all 
events,  the  fate  of  Christianity  is  bound  up  with  them, 
for  they  have  proved  central  to  devotion  and  been  es- 
teemed essential  by  Christian  life  as  well  as  thought, 
throughout  the  ages  before  the  modern  eclipse  of  faith. 
Narrow  applications  and  interpretations  of  these  an- 
cient doctrines  are  exhausted;  yet  even  to-day,  in 
spite  of  liberalizing  tendencies,  they  hold  a  sway  sur- 
prisingly wide.  As  we  recognize  the  power  they  have 
shown,  as  history  went  on,  to  meet  new  needs,  it  will 
surely  be  pertinent  to  dwell  on  their  probable  future. 
If  these  are  to  be  swept  away,  it  is  hard  to  assert 
that  religion  would  be,  in  any  specific  sense,  Christian, 
however  it  might  retain  that  common  fund  of  persist- 
ent ethical  ideals  which  Christianity  shares  with  all 
other  life-giving  religions. 

IV 

Is  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  for  instance,  becom- 
ing a  historic  curiosity,  the  mere  expression  of  past 
pseudo-metaphysical  speculation  ?  Or  is  it  conceivable 
that  this  symbol  of  the  inexpressible  will  appear  less 
arbitrary,  more  satisfying  to  man  thinking  religiously, 
as  time  unfolds  ?  Theological  terms  are  notoriously 
evasive.  Yet  perhaps  it  is  not  fantastic  to  believe  that 

350 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

in  the  future,  "  that  social  thought  of  God,"  as  Phillips 
Brooks  used  to  say,  "  which  we  call  the  doctrine  of 
the  Trinity,"  may  be  more  clearly  interpreted,  nay, 
demanded,  by  the  constitution  of  society  and  the  modes 
of  human  life  than  ever  before.  Why  should  not  its 
message  come  with  new  force  to  a  generation  nurtured 
in  every  nerve  and  fibre  of  its  mental  being  by  the 
social  democracy?  Certainly  the  conception  of  the 
Divine  implied  in  it  is  more  richly  and  closely  related 
to  human  life  than  that  of  a  barren  and  aristocratic 
monotheism.  William  James  restlessly  insisted  that 
pluralistic  or  polytheistic  beliefs  would  afford  a  better 
intellectual  attack  than  monotheism  on  the  ultimate 
realities.  Why  should  not  what  he  means  find  satis- 
faction in  that  Christian  thought  of  the  Final  Mystery 
in  which  not  only  diverse  aspects  of  One  Being,  but  also 
centres  of  consciousness  diversely  related  to  the  uni- 
verse even  while  interdependent,  are  dimly  discerned  ? 
Tritheism  has  become  absurd ;  but  can  the  older  mono- 
theism content  a  generation  possessed  by  the  growing 
sense  of  multiplicity  in  unity,  both  in  regard  to  the 
study  of  nature  and  to  human  experience?  The  de- 
velopment of  the  social  consciousness,  which  will  be 
the  chief  psychical  result  of  the  new  society,  will  in- 
evitably react  upon  the  idea  of  God.  Do  we  not  begin 
to  perceive  a  possible  trend  of  such  reaction  ?  Probably 
we  cannot  imagine  how  far  the  new  social  intuition 
may  lead  us  toward  the  destruction  of  separateness, 
even  while  individuality  is  maintained,  so  that  men 
will  divine  each  the  mind  and  the  heart  of  the  other, 

351 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  RELIGION 

feeling,  acting  in  unison,  while  forfeiting  in  no  degree 
the  miracle  of  individual  life.  May  not  the  trinitarian 
formula  be  a  natural  outcome  in  devout  minds  of  such 
experience  ? 

But  let  us  turn  from  these  inexpressible  hints  to 
simpler  thoughts.  By  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity, 
Christian  thought  was  struggling  to  express  its  superb 
perception  that  love  was  eternal,  and  belonged  in  its 
origin,  not  to  the  contingent,  the  transitory,  but  to  the 
essence  of  Infinite  Being.  Save  for  the  clumsy  phrases 
concerning  a  division  of  persons  in  the  Godhead,  how 
coidd  this  great  truth  have  been  expressed?  Pressing 
behind  the  visible  and  temporal  universe,  in  the  depths 
of  the  Uncreated,  thought  divined  Love  present  from 
the  beginning.  Faith  in  a  Son,  "  begotten  before  all 
worlds,"  through  a  relation  conceived  as  the  archetype 
to  the  most  sacred  human  experience,  in  a  Spirit  ever 
"  proceeding  from  the  Father  and  the  Son,"  and  in 
that  eternal  procession  excluding  from  Deity  the  least 
possibility  of  limitation  or  self-absorption,  represented 
the  final  triumph  of  religious  thought.  It  lifted  over 
a  world  ravaged  by  hate  and  selfishness  its  desperate, 
glorious  assertion  that  the  abiding  reality  was  found, 
not  in  isolation,  but  in  fellowship ;  not  in  self-seeking, 
but  in  a  giving  of  self  to  the  uttermost ;  not  in  person- 
ality shut  in  upon  itself,  but  in  an  equal  interchange 
of  love  attaining  that  highest  unity  which  only  differen- 
tiation can  produce.  Such,  doubtless,  was  the  impulse 
underlying  the  trinitarian  formula.  It  is  an  impulse 
likely,  in  the  future,  as  we  have  seen,  to  be  strength- 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

ened ;  that  it  will  cling  to  the  old  formula  we]  cannot 
assert,  yet  we  may  say  that  the  full  meaning  of  that 
formula  should  be  revealed  as  never  before  while  the 
meaning  of  human  fellowship  grows  more  intense  and 
our  power  deepens  to  realize  the  vast  complex  of  cen- 
tres of  experience  which  are  yet  mystically  and  abso- 
lutely one. 

These  are  high  matters.  Thought  gropes  and  stum- 
bles less  in  turning  to  other  ideas,  closely  interwoven 
with  the  effort  to  express  the  farthest  reaches  of  the 
Divine  Nature,  yet  more  directly  and  tenderly  within 
the  range  of  human  experience.  Faith  in  Incarnation 
and  Atonement  has  been  through  Christian  history 
central  to  the  devotion  of  the  faithful.  The  extent  of 
the  need  to  which  they  minister  is  evidenced  by  their 
presence  in  other  religions,  but  their  association  with 
the  historic  life  of  Jesus  would  seem  to  have  given 
them  new  permanence  and  honor.  For  nowhere  else 
have  they  passed  from  theory  so  deep  into  the  very 
heart  of  life  and  become  so  effectively  operative. 

Now,  "  incarnational"  ideas  would  find  logical  place 
and  development  in  the  socialist  commonwealth  as  they 
have  never  done  before.  These  social  institutions  would 
afford  the  natural  soil  in  which  they  and  the  kindred 
doctrine  of  a  Holy  Spirit,  indwelling  in  nature,  and 
more  especially  in  consecrated  humanity,  could  flour- 
ish; the  doctrines  in  their  turn  would  give  exactly  the 
needed  sanction  to  democratic  and  yet  more  to  social- 
istic theory.  It  would  seem  that  these  doctrines  must 
have  had  a  severe  struggle  to  commend  or  maintain 

353 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

themselves  during  the  Middle  Ages  and  earlier,  when 
the  natural  order  was  regarded  by  the  spiritually 
minded  as  an  asset  of  the  powers  of  evil.  And  indeed, 
from  the  days  when  early  gnosticisms,  shrinking  af- 
frighted and  disgusted  from  the  idea  of  a  real  Incar- 
nation, forced  Catholic  thought  to  the  great  affirma- 
tions of  the  Athanasian  Creed,  we  can  plainly  watch 
the  struggle.  It  was  a  struggle  never  abandoned.  The 
Christian  who  is  also  a  socialist  can  say  that,  despite  su- 
perficial appearances  to  the  contrary,  it  has  really  been 
the  belief  in  the  Incarnation,  working  in  the  depths, 
misunderstood  by  its  most  ardent  adherents,  that  has 
led  the  western  nations  on  to  their  present  strong  and 
clear  demand  for  the  rehabilitation  of  the  natural  order. 
Much  confusion  obtains  at  this  point,  and  people  from 
both  camps  will  cry  out  against  us.  Yet  surely  the 
Christian  who  reproaches  the  socialist  with  material- 
ism, because  he  wants  to  begin  the  process  of  social 
redemption  with  the  establishment  of  right  physical 
conditions,  is  disloyal.  Belief  that  the  spirit  must  and 
can  be  revealed  only  through  the  instrument  of  flesh 
is  natural  to  one  who  has  knelt  at  Bethlehem.  In  the 
doctrine  of  the  Incarnation  is  the  warrant  to  all  think- 
ing Christian  men  for  the  socialist  hope,  so  scouted  by 
many  followers  of  a  false  idealism,  that  the  effective 
protection  of  bodily  health  and  material  decencies  will 
emancipate  the  higher  life  of  mind  and  spirit.  And 
we  may  surely  picture  to  ourselves  this  doctrine,  so 
closely  associated  with  the  most  effective  Teacher  of 
the  ethics  that  must  underlie  the  very  foundations  of 

354 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

the  socialist  state,  commending  itself  more  completely 
in  that  state  than  ever  before. 

And  further :  in  the  faith  in  the  Incarnation  and 
the  indwelling  of  the  Holy  Spirit — apprehended  as 
they  have  always  been  within  western  Christendom, 
but  with  increasing  clearness  —  may  lie  the  corrective 
for  those  exclusively  immanential  ideas  which  already 
threaten  to  become  current.  For  this  faith  presents 
the  point  of  union  for  transcendental  and  immanen- 
tial thought.  To  the  Christian  that  power  which  ex- 
presses God  through  man  is  no  mere  product  of  an 
evolving  nature  ;  it  must  descend  from  above.  That 
Spirit  who  is  the  Lord  and  Giver  of  life  is  not  only 
the  soul 

That  wields  the  world  with  never-wearied  love, 
Sustains  it  from  below  and  quickens  it  above, 

as  the  all  but  inspired  verse  implies  ;  it  flows  in  upon 
us  from  a  region  beyond  the  universe  we  know  or  sur- 
mise. These  ideas  will  doubtless  be  modified  and  en- 
riched as  thought  goes  on  and  experience  deepens. 
Yet  if,  on  large  lines,  they  can  hold  their  own,  they 
will  counteract  the  risk  always  involved  in  purely  pan- 
theistic schemes,  which  tend,  first  to  weaken  the  moral 
sense;  and  second,  to  blur  the  vision  of  an  absolute 
perfection  beyond  the  changing  order,  and  thus,  in 
the  long  run,  to  destroy  the  possibility  of  progress  and 
produce,  as  in  the  East,  a  civilization  that  does  not 
move  onward,  but  returns  upon  itself  from  age  to 
age. 

355 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 


Among  all  ideas  potent  in  historic  Christianity,  that 
of  the  Atonement  is  to-day  the  most  unpopular.  Ugly 
travesties  and  crude  forms,  long  abandoned  by  all 
thinking  people,  are  still  attacked  as  if  they  were  liv- 
ing faiths,  with  a  repugnance  which  measures  the  whole- 
some horror  they  have  inspired.  Yet  apparently  there 
is  something  in  the  idea  which  will  not  be  ignored. 
Still,  though  all  thought  of  propitiating  an  angry  god 
or  buying  off  a  malignant  devil  has  faded,  the  faith 
in  redemption  as  essential,  as  accomplished,  works 
secretly  at  the  heart  of  all  which  lives  in  the  old  re- 
ligion. Types  of  Christianity  that  evade  it  grow  pallid, 
formal,  and  cold.  Still  the  Cross  crowns  the  pinnacles 
of  our  churches,  rises  from  countless  altars,  is  hidden 
in  the  hearts  of  the  faithful.  Still  the  Eucharistic 
Feast  shows  forth  the  Lord's  death  till  he  come  and 
summon  his  disciples  to  "  fill  up  that  which  is  behind 
of  the  sufferings  of  Christ."  The  ideal  of  sacrifice, 
deeply  implanted  in  all  great  religions,  has  been  trans- 
figured by  Christianity  with  strange  new  glory.  Should 
it  perish,  whatever  name  the  religion  of  the  future  may 
bear,  this  will  not  be  the  Christianity  known  to  Europe 
for  nigh  two  thousand  years. 

But  it  is  against  this  very  ideal  that  the  psychical 
forces  of  the  socialist  state  are  sure  to  rally  with  most 
antagonistic  vigor ;  here  we  may  say,  in  all  reverence, 
the  crux  of  the  coming  struggle  will  be  found.  For 
what  the  doctrine  of  the  Atonement  implies  is  the  re- 

356 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

pudiation  of  all  easy-going  hedonism.  A  growing  re- 
volt against  sacrificial  ideas  has  been  coincident  with 
the  rise  of  democracy.  In  the  cooperative  common- 
wealth a  yet  more  pervading  reverence  for  life  in  its 
fullness,  a  deepening  confidence  in  human  nature,  will 
involve  a  loathing  of  mutilation  in  any  form  which  may 
well  seem  incompatible  with  the  teaching  of  the  Cross. 
The  religion  of  Christ,  if  this  teaching  be  indeed  its  cen- 
tre, may  look  forward  to  the  fiercest  struggle  that  it 
has  ever  yet  known.  Other  leading  doctrinal  concep- 
tions —  those  of  the  Trinity  and  of  the  Incarnation 
—  may,  as  we  have  seen,  find  response  from  the  deeper 
instincts  born  of  the  New  Order.  Faith  in  this  final 
mystery,  which  completes  the  ministry  of  Christianity 
to  the  soul  and  its  power  as  an  educating  force,  will 
run  athwart  the  surface  impulses  of  civilization  and 
must  be  maintained,  if  at  all,  in  contradiction  to  its 
apparent  laws. 

Yet,  unless  the  teaching  of  the  Cross  can  endure, 
our  labor,  from  the  Christian  point  of  view,  will  have 
been  all  in  vain.  For  in  no  soft  civilization  can  the 
soul  attain  its  growth ;  and  opportunity  for  martyr- 
dom is  essential  to  fullness  of  life. 

Christianity  will  not,  indeed,  be  alone  in  recogniz- 
ing the  need  for  expiation  and  atonement.  Those  as- 
cetic types  of  religion  which,  as  we  have  seen,  are 
likely  to  come  flooding  in  from  the  East,  offering  cor- 
rectives to  the  general  ease,  will  summon  their  votaries 
to  strange  self-mortifications.  But  these  religions  will 
form  a  current  opposed,  not  only  to  the  superficial 

357 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

dangers,  but  also  to  the  creative  and  healthful  forces 
by  which  the  new  society  will  be  nourished.  For  they 
are  all  alike  founded  on  ingrained  distrust  and  re- 
pudiation of  the  world  of  sense.  Now  the  value  of 
pure  asceticism  is  over.  The  distinctive  mark  and 
crowning  honor  of  Christianity  is  the  clearness  with 
which  it  combines  perception  of  the  necessity  for  sacri- 
fice with  full  faith  in  the  sanctity  of  the  natural  order 
when  once  redeemed  by  love.  If  a  religion  of  sacrifice 
is  to  hold  its  ground  at  all,  we  should  surely  wish  it 
to  prevail  in  the  Christian  form  rather  than  in  forms 
that  run  counter  to  the  best  instincts  and  gains  of 
democracy. 

Love  holds  the  key  to  the  situation.  Why  is  it  true 
that  martyrdom  is  life  at  its  height  ?  Not  because  suf- 
fering is  in  itself  good,  —  we  may  hope  that  this  ugly 
fallacy  will  never  be  believed  again,  —  but  because 
only  through  suffering  can  love,  which  is  the  end  of 
all  personal  and  social  striving,  be  manifest  and  per- 
fected. Not  all  suffering  is  sacrifice.  But  we  should 
not  be  far  wrong  if  we  said  that  only  suffering  which 
is  sacrifice  can  ennoble,  though  one  hastens  to  add  that 
the  mere  endurance  of  inflicted  pain  may  acquire  sacri- 
ficial quality  through  voluntary  submission.  It  should, 
then,  be  the  aim  of  social  advance  to  reduce  as 
much  as  possible  all  pain  that  is  not  sacrificial,  but 
only  in  order  that  sacrificial  pain  may  shine  forth  as 
the  crowning  glory  to  which  character  can  attain. 

Unless  the  future  offer  opportunity  for  such  glory 
we  must  account  it  failure.  A  community  in  which,  to 

358 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

quote  one  socialist  theory,  "  the  good  of  the  individual 
and  the  good  of  the  whole  can  never  be  at  odds," 
might  be  the  meanest  ever  known,  for  love  might  know 
no  heroisms  there.  The  summons  to  that  Way  of  the 
Cross  which  is  the  Way  of  Life  must  sound  through 
all  the  amenities  and  melodies  of  the  gentle  civilization 
of  our  dreams  ;  otherwise  our  boasted  commonwealth 
of  life  will  be  a  commonwealtn  of  death,  and  a  race  l 

With  ghastly  smooth  life,  dead  at  heart, 
Tame  in  earth's  paddock  for  her  prize, 

will  cruelly  mock  the  martyrdoms  through  which  its 
freedom  has  been  won. 

The  true  test  of  a  religion  of  sacrifice  is  to  come. 
During  those  early  Christian  centuries,  so  racked  by 
violence,  men  clung  desperately  to  the  Cross  as  the 
only  refuge  from  a  world  of  pain.  The  sign  of  £  re- 
deeming agony,  erected  at  the  centre  of  the  market- 
place, rising  from  sweet  country  ways,  taught  every- 
where its  silent  lesson  and  led  men  on  to  ardors  of 
mortification  and  devotion  in  which  egotistic  fears  and 
false  theories  of  life  often  mingled  with  nobler  things. 
Those  days,  with  their  special  incentives  and  confusions, 
will  never  return.  When  their  stern  j)rops  are  removed, 
when  life  on  the  surface  shall  have  become  pacific, 
productive,  easily  fraternal,  will  it  become  selfish  and 
enervating  too  ? 

No,  for  the  goal  of  perfection  is  infinitely  far,  and 
advance  will  show  new  reaches  of  the  way.  The  true 
greatness  of  Christianity  then  as  now  will  consist  in 

1  Browning,  Easter  Day. 
369 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

revealing  the  restrictions  and  refusals  of  life  as  its 
greatest  positive  opportunities.  The  salutary  disci- 
plines of  the  socialist  state  will  put  people  in  an  attitude 
to  understand  this  perhaps  better  than  they  do  now, 
for,  as  we  have  seen,  the  principles  that  regulate  the 
general  conduct  will  point  in  those  days  to  the  Way 
of  Renunciation  as  the  only  way  of  freedom.  Many 
will  never  get  beyond  the  general  recognition  of  this 
principle  in  the  acceptance  of  what  society  enforces 
on  every  one.  Yet  those  who  are  called  will  penetrate 
still  deeper,  and  obedience  in  the  name  of  pure  love 
to  the  law  of  sacrifice  to  the  uttermost,  in  a  civiliza- 
tion where  that  law  will  be  no  longer  enforced  but 
voluntary,  will  afford  the  precise  test  of  faith  which 
the  Apologia  of  Religion  demanded,  —  loyalty  to  a 
mandate  from  above,  at  cross-purposes  with  the  more 
superficial  aspects  of  the  natural  order.  For  those 
who  can  receive  it,  the  teaching  of  the  Cross  will  meet 
the  last  needs  of  the  socialized  community. 

It  will  have  taken  close  on  two  thousand  years  — 
perhaps  quite  two  thousand  —  to  achieve  the  social 
acceptance  of  the  ethical  ideals  of  Christianity.  This 
victory  will  be  no  signal  for  pause.  From  the  begin- 
ning a  sterner  teaching  was  implicit  in  the  words  of 
the  Founder  of  the  Faith ;  but  it  was  revealed  only  to 
those  who  had  received  the  elementary  laws  of  the 
Kingdom.  Not  to  the  crowds  of  the  Mount  of  Beati- 
tudes, but  to  a  straggling  group  of  foot-sore  apostles, 
was  the  command  issued  to  take  up  the  Cross  and 
follow  him ;  and  only  in  the  upper  chamber,  probably 

360 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHEISTIANITY 

after  the  traitor  had  withdrawn,  was  the  full  force  of 
the  command,  with  its  implications  of  life  given  for 
the  Beloved,  made  wholly  plain.  So,  in  the  long  un- 
folding through  history  of  the  teaching  given  in  sym- 
bol and  miniature  during  the  earthly  life  of  Jesus,  the 
time  may  come  for  a  harder  struggle  just  where  vic- 
tory seems  reached,  — 

And  where  we  look  for  crowns  to  fall, 
We  find  the  tug  's  to  come  —  that 's  all. 

The  true  idea  of  disinterested  sacrifice  can  only  come 
to  its  own  when  cruder  theories  of  self-centred  ascet- 
icism have  been  outgrown,  and  when  the  external  con- 
ditions of  life  shall  no  longer  force  misery  and  endur- 
ance on  the  majority  of  a  passive  humanity. 

Scouted  on  the  surface,  the  Law  of  the  Cross  must 
be  the  inner  strength  of  a  society  that  would  realize 
brotherhood.  Vicarious  atonement!  It  has  been  the 
most  scorned  of  all  Christian  doctrines ;  it  is  viewed 
to-day  with  cold  incredulity.  Yet  it  is  entirely  and 
superbly  democratic,  and  the  slow  education  of  the 
race  is  bringing  us  to  the  point  where  it  must  come  to 
its  own,  rediscovered,  reasserted,  the  culminating  ex- 
pression of  the  deepest  intuitions  fostered  by  the  New 
Order.  Through  Christian  history  the  doctrine  has 
been  a  germ  of  growth,  training  the  selfish  peoples  to 
a  dim  and  confused  perception  that  no  man  liveth  or 
dieth  to  himself,  and  that  there  are  no  depths,  spiritual 
or  physical,  at  which  he  is  powerless  to  help  his 
brother.  To-day,  democracy  and  psychical  science  are 

361 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

combining  to  show  us  the  unbelievably  intimate  unity 
of  the  life  of  the  whole  race,  —  a  unity  so  close  that 
our  own  spiritual  state  undoubtedly  sends  its  vibra- 
tions through  the  whole  unseen  universe,  making  at 
every  moment  for  the  salvation  or  destruction  of  the 
whole.  And  in  so  combining  they  show  us  the  actuality 
and  meaning  of  the  ancient  doctrines. 

Beyond  what  beckoning  ways  the  Cross  may  rise  is 
not  for  us  to  see.  Many  opportunities  for  sacrifice  will 
obviously  be  unchanged.  Industrial  relations  do  not 
constitute  the  whole  of  life ;  the  region  of  personal 
ties,  for  instance,  will  be  unaffected,  so  far  as  chances 
for  self-abnegation  go,  by  changes  in  the  social  order. 
We  cannot  doubt,  moreover,  that  the  new  society  will 
offer  new  occasions.  In  repudiation  of  easily  accessi- 
ble opulence  for  the  sake  of  a  higher  good ;  in  sub- 
ordination, always  a  harder  task  than  rejection ;  it 
may  be  in  lonely  adventure  into  far  realms  of  psychical 
experience  from  which  the  pioneer  may  bring  back 
messages  of  hope  for  all,  the  law  may  be  fulfilled. 

But  chiefly  we  must  trust  the  very  fact  of  social 
advance  to  engender  an  ever-new  anguish  that  will 
call  for  an  ever -new  redemption.  We  cannot,  even 
casually,  contemplate  sacrifice  without  encountering 
an  obstinate  phenomenon  —  the  consciousness  of  sin. 
Sin !  The  modern  world  evades  the  word.  Doctor  Eliot 
has  no  place  for  it  in  his  new  religion.  A  clergyman, 
writing  in  the  "  Hibbert  Journal,"  avows,  with  a  can- 
dor that  claims  respect,  that  it  is  to  him  repellent 
and  meaningless.  Yet  conviction  of  sin  is  the  first 

362 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

condition  of  growth.  The  thought  of  sacrifice  implies 
not  only  a  giving  but  a  receiving,  and  the  race  that 
produces  saviors  must  also  need  to  be  saved.  The 
holiest  men  have  always  experienced  the  most  bitter 
penitence;  nor  can  we  imagine  it  otherwise  with  the 
nobler  community  of  our  dreams.  A  humanity  that, 
through  the  joint  pressure  of  economic  and  moral 
forces,  has  at  last  achieved  social  forms  which  express 
the  alphabet  of  Christian  ethics,  must  be  increasingly 
sensitive  to  its  moral  failures  if  its  success  is  to  mean 
progress.  One  shrinks  from  imagining  a  society  de- 
void of  the  life-giving  sting  of  remorse.  There  will 
always  be  some  to  feel  this  sting.  We  cannot  here 
sound,  but  we  may  at  least  recognize,  the  power  of 
Christianity  to  meet  their  need.  We  saw  it  competent 
to  correct  the  moral  superficiality  that  may  be  all  too 
prevalent,  by  holding  up  its  inexorable  ideal  of  ab- 
solute holiness;  we  see  it  now  competent  to  heal  the 
wound  of  these  souls  of  deeper  insight ;  for  in  that 
very  ideal  which  is  the  Judge,  it  beholds,  by  miracle 
of  grace,  the  Redeemer.  The  Supreme  Sacrifice  to 
which  its  eyes  are  turned  has,  as  it  claims,  riot  risen 
from  the  natural  order,  but  been  manifest  from  above. 
So  it  is  that  the  religion  of  the  Cross  has  proved  com- 
petent throughout  history  to  quicken  at  once  that 
sense  of  failure  and  that  confident  hope  of  renewal, 
from  the  union  of  which  comes  power  to  go  on. 

O  Love  of  God!  0  sin  of  man  ! 

In  this  dread  hour  your  strength  is  tried, 

And  victory  remains  with  love  ! 

363 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

It  seems  unlikely  that  in  any  living  civilization  these 
lines  should  lose  their  force.  That  vision  of  perfection 
which  Christian  teachers  hold  aloft  will  always  be 
needed.  But  the  shadow  of  the  Cross  must  always 
'fall  along  a  path  where  the  vision  of  perfection  sheds 
its  light. 

So  thorny  is  this  path  of  life  that  the  only  strength 
which  has  enabled  man  to  tread  in  it  is  the  belief  that 
God  has  trodden  it  first.  If  the  doctrine  of  the  Trin- 
ity means  that  love  was  at  the  beginning,  so  Calvary 
means  to  the  Christian  heart  that  love  is  at  the  end 
also.  A  Deity  who  did  not  stoop  to  the  last  agony 
would  be  a  God  surpassed  by  man  "  in  the  one  way  of 
love,"  —  man,  so  eager  to  die  for  his  beloved,  —  and 
so,  no  God  at  all.  The  Cross  is  necessary  to  the  full 
conception  of  Godhead.  So  awfully  compelling  is  the 
vision  of  the  Way  of  Sorrows  with  one  despised  and 
rejected  moving  along  it  to  Calvary,  that  the  most 
rebellious  eyes  must  see  it  wherever  they  turn.  In  Ib- 
sen's "  Emperor  and  Galilean,"  Julian  the  Apostate 
fights  a  lifelong,  losing  battle  against  the  Galilean, 
in  the  name  of  the  fair  glories  of  the  Pagan  world. 
On  the  night  before  his  last  conflict,  he  recounts  a 
dream :  — 

Where  is  He  now  ?  Has  He  been  at  work  elsewhere, 
since  that  happened  at  Golgotha  ? 

I  dreamed  of  Him  lately.  I  dreamed  that  I  ordained 
that  the  memory  of  the  Galilean  should  be  rooted  out  on 
earth.  Then  I  soared  aloft  into  infinite  space  till  my  feet 
rested  on  another  world. 

364 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

But  behold  —  there  came  a  procession  by  me,  on  the 
strange  earth  where  I  stood.  And  in  the  midst  of  the  slow- 
moving  array  was  the  Galilean,  alive,  and  bearing  a  cross 
on  His  back.  Then  I  called  to  Him  and  said :  "  Whither 
away,  Galilean  ? "  But  He  turned  His  head  toward  me, 
smiled,  nodded  slowly,  and  said :  "  To  the  Place  of  the 
Skull." 

Where  is  He  now?  What  if  that  at  Golgotha,  near 
Jerusalem,  was  but  a  wayside  matter,  a  thing  done  as  it 
were  in  passing,  in  a  leisure  hour  ?  What  if  He  goes  on  and 
on,  and  suffers,  and  dies,  and  conquers,  again  and  again, 
from  world  to  world  ? 

From  world  to  world,  also  from  age  to  age.  The 
great  doctrine  of  the  Atonement,  like  all  the  other 
Christian  doctrines,  is  viewed  more  and  more  "  sub 
specie  seternitatis."  Under  the  growing  perception  of 
the  divine  fulfilled  in  the  human,  we  come  to  know 
that  redemption  is  achieved,  not  by  a  God  working 
apart  from  His  creation  and  performing  isolated  mir- 
acles, but  by  the  union  in  sacrificial  passion  of  all 
who  would  spend  themselves  for  the  world's  need  and 
rescue  it  from  its  sins  by  the  very  anguish  of  their  peni- 
tence, following  the  Captain  of  their  salvation.  That 
such  sacrifice  is  eternally  necessary  to  progress  has 
always  been  clear  to  the  Christian  vision.  That  it  will 
be  less  generally  acknowledged  in  the  coming  age  is 
highly  probable.  That  it  will  ever  die  from  the 
hearts  of  the  faithful  is  not  to  be  conceived.  Oppor- 
tunities for  new  martyrdoms  will  rise  from  the  very 
conditions  of  the  society  we  seek  to  evoke.  For  Cal- 
vary is  ever  near  to  the  metropolis.  We  labor  to  build 

365 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

Jerusalem,  and  hope  to  succeed  in  part.  But  though 
we  obtain  a  better  image  than  our  fathers  of  that 
"Ci vitas  Dei  "  for  which  their  eyes  have  longed,  we 
may  rest  in  no  complacency.  Beside  our  New  Jerusa- 
lem, as  beside  the  Old,  will  rise  the  Hill  of  Golgotha. 
So  it  will  be  till  we  attain  that  Jerusalem  which  is 
above  and  free,  the  mother  of  us  all:  through  all  im- 
aginable social  transformations,  Christ,  in  the  person 
of  his  followers,  will  still  be  despised  and  rejected  of 
men,  and  still  the  despised  and  rejected  may  be  the 
saviors  of  the  race. 

VI 

Such  gifts  have  the  old  doctrines  to  bring  the  new 
society.  We  have  hinted  that  the  distinctive  point  in 
these  doctrines  is  their  relation  to  the  historic  person- 
ality of  Jesus.  It  is  belief  in  this  Personality,  as  the 
one  vision  of  perfection  revealed  to  human  gropings, 
which  has  given  them  their  persistent  power  through 
changing  social  forms,  and  has  placed  a  rock  beneath 
the  feet  of  the  faithful.  To  assert  what  is  likely  to  be- 
fall our  views  concerning  the  authenticity  of  the  re- 
cords which  enshrine  this  Personality  would  be  pre- 
sumption in  the  present  agitated  juncture ;  it  would 
in  any  case  fall  outside  the  scope  of  this  book.  But  it 
is  in  line  with  our  discussion  to  suggest  that  a  religion 
which  shall  commend  itself  to  a  period  in  which  eco- 
nomic determinism  with  its  inexorable  respect  for  ex- 
ternal historic  fact  gives  the  clue  to  social  advance  and 
to  interpretation  of  the  past,  will  thrive  best  if  it  rests 

366 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

on  a  foundation  of  acknowledged  historical  reality ; 
and  that  the  claim  to  such  a  basis,  which  some  Christ- 
ian apologists  are  to-day  inclined  to  evade  as  weak- 
ness, may  be  considered  in  more  scientific  days  to 
clinch  the  distinctive  power  of  Christianity  as  com- 
pared with  other  religions.  Such  religions  are  coined 
in  plenty  from  a  mingling  of  taste  and  theory,  and  it 
is  the  modern  instinct  to  feel  that  subjectivism  of  this' 
order  is  the  only  sure  ground  for  faith.  Yet  prag- 
matism itself  may  some  day  lead  us  to  feel  that  our  old 
friend,  an  historic  revelation,  needs  no  apology,  and 
that  the  theological  conceptions  and  ideals  which  so 
marvelously  meet  the  needs  of  each  new  stage  in  the 
social  and  psychical  drama  are  in  last  analysis  only 
sustained  by  the  evidence  they  receive  from  a  Life 
once  lived  on  plain  earthly  soil  and  at  a  definite  point 
of  the  world's  story. 

VII 

We  may  look  forward,  then,  to  a  society  in  which 
Christianity  will  still  be  a  living  force.  Many  rivals 
may  dispute  the  ground  with  it.  Its  scope  and  the 
number  of  its  adherents  may  be  smaller;  the  life- 
giving  principle  at  its  heart  may  have  to  encounter 
insidious  and  sharp  opposition  from  many  directions. 
Yet,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  it  alone  will  have  the  power 
to  furnish  the  secret  strength  without  which  the  very 
civilization  that  discards  it  could  never  survive.  As 
of  old,  so  forever,  its  dying  may  be  the  life  of  the 
world. 

367 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

If  in  conclusion  we  ask  what  form  of  historic  Christ- 
ianity seems  best  fitted  to  survive  the  deep  changes 
imminent,  and  to  commend  themselves  in  the  new  so- 
ciety, a  paradoxical  answer  forces  itself  upon  us. 
Catholicism  and  socialism  are  violent  opponents  to-day. 
Yet  it  has  happened  before  now  in  history  that  dearest 
foes  in  seeming  have  been  dearest  friends  in  truth : 
retrospect,  indeed,  reveals  again  and  again  a  curious 
unity  in  fundamental  tone  and  aim  between  opposing 
forces  in  a  given  epoch.  Thus,  Cavaliers  and  Round- 
heads denounced  each  the  other  in  the  seventeenth 
century  as  vehemently  as  Catholics  and  socialists 
to-day :  yet  the  theology  of  Bunyan  the  Puritan 
runs  on  practically  the  same  lines  as  that  of  Her- 
bert the  Anglican  or  Crashaw  the  Roman,  and  the 
fervent,  stately  prose  of  Baxter  is  indistinguishable 
at  times  from  that  of  Browne.  It  is  not  a  priori 
impossible  that  the  future  will  discern  a  like  unity, 
in  spirit  and  essential  aim,  between  the  Catholic 
and  socialist  schools  of  the  nineteenth  and  twentieth 
centuries. 

It  would  seem  logical  to  suggest  that  Catholicism, 
as  the  more  social  form  of  Christianity,  is  more  likely 
than  Protestantism  to  adapt  itself  to  the  socialized  state ; 
for  it  will  have  more  in  common  with  the  instincts  and 
habits  which  this  state  will  foster.  Catholicism  and 
socialism  unite  to  subordinate  yet  deepen  that  individ- 
ual life  which  Protestantism  exalts  without  probing. 
The  discipline  of  the  secular  state  will  find  its  exact 
religious  counterpart  in  the  Catholic  system  ;  and  citi- 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

zens  trained  on  the  lines  of  the  commonwealth  should 
make  excellent  sons  of  the  Church.  Still  further,  the 
frank  acceptance  of  evolutionary  principles  on  which 
a  social  democracy  is  based  would  find  a  perfect  cor- 
relative in  Catholicism.  It  may  seem  humorous  to 
speak  of  that  church,  which  of  all  modern  powers 
clings  most  resolutely  to  the  pas-t,  as  a  progressive  force. 
Yet  nothing  can  grow  that  is  not  rooted  ;  where  are  the 
roots  of  Protestantism,  considered,  not  as  an  individual 
attitude,  but  as  a  social  religion  ?  We  may  not  forget 
that  the  great  names  which  flashed  the  evolutionary 
idea  on  the  nineteenth  century  were  not  two,  but  three, 
—  the  principle  which  Darwin  enunciated  in  natural 
science  and  Karl  Marx  in  economics  was  proclaimed 
in  the  central  sphere  of  religion,  and  at  an  earlier 
date,  by  John  Henry  Newman.  There  are  deeper 
points  of  contact  still.  For  certain  minds  of  no  super- 
ficial order  the  sacramental  system  will  afford  the  very 
interpretation  of  life  for  which  a  perfected  democracy 
must  yearn.  If,  finally,  Matthew  Arnold  be  right  in 
saying  that  Catholicism  has  a  firmer  hold  than  Pro- 
testantism on  the  secret  of  Jesus,  —  on  that  necessity 
for  sacrifice  which  we  have  seen  to  be  central  to  Christ- 
ian thought,  —  then,  in  a  civilization  where  the  religion 
of  Christ  can  alone  rightly  supply  this  need,  Catholi- 
cism should  prevail.  We  can,  indeed,  plainly  foresee 
various  forms  of  nominal  Christianity,  more  or  less 
closely  affiliated  to  humanitarian  or  pantheistic  schemes, 
which  will  disregard  the  intellectual  travail  of  the 
Catholic  ages,  while  yet  they  award  to  Christ  a  leading 

369 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

place  in  the  pantheon  of  the  world's  heroes.  But  the 
more  austere  Church,  which,  singing  forever  its  "  O 
Salutaris  Hostia ! "  steadfastly  elevates  the  Host  in 
benediction  above  a  sinful  world,  is  likely  to  draw  to 
itself,  with  few  exceptions,  those  for  whom  Christianity 
is  not  a  relative  theory,  but  a  revelation  of  absolute 
though  unfolding  truth.  True,  this  Church  herself  must 
undergo  sweeping  and  searching  modifications  before 
she  can  fulfill  such  a  function.  But  do  we  not  already, 
to-day,  see  her  in  the  agony  of  inward  transformation? 
If  the  nobler  forces  in  which  she  so  abounds  can  only 
conquer,  it  is  not  difficult  to  picture  the  august 
Church  Catholic  pursuing  a  life-giving  and  sacrificial 
way  within  that  cooperative  society  which  will  bless 
Christianity  at  once  with  a  fuller  chance  to  expand 
and  with  more  powerful  foes  to  fight  than  ever  it  has 
known  before. 

Thus,  all  the  more  on  account  of  the  probable  prev- 
alence of  other  religions,  Christian  doctrine  no  less 
than  Christian  ethics  may  find  freer  play  and  win  deeper 
understanding  in  the  coming  days.  But  a  truce  to  spec- 
ulation !  Out  of  its  mazes  we  need  to  hold  one  clue  only : 
the  assurance  that  the  race  of  the  future,  released  from 
the  languor  and  material  bondage  that  weigh  our  spirits 
down,  may  care  for  Truth  with  a  new  intensity,  and 
know  more  anguish  than  we  in  the  search  for  her,  more 
joy  in  the  possession.  In  the  new  society  as  in  the  old, 
religious  passion  will  rise  out  of  the  very  substance  of  life 
itself.  During  this  time  of  transition  it  is  our  high  privi- 
lege to  keep  the  flame  from  which  the  new  altars  shall  be 

370 


SOCIALISM  AND  CHRISTIANITY 

kindled  alit  from  the  old  and  eternal  source.  For  only 
if  the  flame  can  burn  more  brightly  on  the  altar  of  the 
Spirit  will  it  be  worth  while  for  human  labor  to  have 
built  the  altar  better  and  to  have  adorned  it  more 
beautifully. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD  AND  THE  SOCIALIST  STATE 


WHATEVER  we  may  think  of  the  theology  of  his 
followers,  the  ideals  of  Jesus  himself  are  of  vital  in- 
terest to  us  all.  It  is  by  no  means  easy  to  apprehend 
these  ideals  aright.  Jesus  of  Nazareth  has  been  claimed 
by  republicans  and  anarchists,  by  revolutionaries  and 
conservatives.  Submission  the  most  servile,  rebellion 
the  most  audacious,  have  been  preached  in  his  Name. 
He  has  been  represented  in  art  as  the  severe  feudal 
overlord,  as  the  womanish  sentimentalist,  as  the  vio- 
lent fanatic.  More  than  a  hundred  years  ago,  when 
the  Christ  of  Things  as  They  Are  was  most  compla- 
cently invoked,  AVilliam  Blake  sang  in  stinging  words 
the  Christ  of  the  Revolution  :  — 

The  vision  of  Christ  that  thou  dost  see 
Is  my  vision's  greatest  enemy. 
Both  read  the  Bible  day  and  night, 
But  thou  readst  black  where  I  read  white. 


He  scorned  earth's  parents,  scorned  earth's  God, 

And  mocked  the  one  and  the  other  rod; 

His  seventy  disciples  sent 

Against  religion  and  government; 

He  left  his  father's  trade  to  roam 

A  wandering  vagrant  without  home,  — 

372 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


And  thus  he  others'  labor  stole, 
That  he  might  live  without  control. 

The  God  of  this  world  raged  in  vain; 
He  bound  old  Satan  in  his  chain, 
And  bursting  forth,  his  furious  ire 
Became  a  chariot  of  fire. 
Where'er  his  chariot  took  the  way 
The  gates  of  death  let  in  the  day. 

I  'm  sure  this  Jesus  will  not  do 
Either  for  Englishman  or  Jew. 

Nobody  paid  much  attention  to  "The  Everlasting 
Gospel."  But  as  modern  life  went  on,  the  oppressed 
and  the  restless  began  to  be  more  and  more  aware 
of  the  paradoxical  contrast  between  that  Tidings  to 
which  the  common  people  had  once  listened  so  gladly 
and  the  Christianity  of  the  churches.  Revolutionary 
assemblies  which  hissed  the  Church  clapped  the  name 
of  Christ,  and  the  idea  that  Jesus  and  his  gospel  are 
a  disturbing  rather  than  a  conservative  force  made 
more  and  more  headway. 

To-day,  thanks  to  the  devoted  labor  spent  on  sources 
and  documents,  the  human  Jesus  is  coming  out  of  the 
past  to  meet  us.  As  Rauschenbusch  remarks  in  his 
noble  book,  "  Christianity  and  the  Social  Crisis,"  we 
are  better  equipped  to  comprehend  what  manner  of 
man  he  was,  and  to  what  end  he  lived,  than  any  gen- 
eration since  his  contemporaries.  It  is  strangely  in- 
teresting that  this  should  happen  at  the  precise  crisis 
when  that  Orient  from  which  his  religion  was  deflected 

373 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

begins  to  be  brought  into  vital  relations  with  the  Oc- 
cident which  is  superficially  so  much  more  alien  to  his 
ideas,  and  when  the  social  order,  which  has  for  centu- 
ries sheltered  itself  under  his  name,  seems  on  the  point 
of  passing  away. 

The  clearest  certainty  which  a  fresh  reading  of  the 
Gospels  brings  to  a  modern  mind  is  that  Jesus,  at  the 
lowest  estimate,  was  one  of  the  chief  social  idealists 
of  the  world.  To  be  this,  a  man  must  be  more  than 
a  dreamer  or  a  haphazard  benefactor  of  others.  He 
must  have  definite  purpose  steadfastly  followed,  wide 
vision  vividly  announced.  Jesus  had  these  in  full  meas- 
ure. The  old  conception  of  a  compassionate  Saviour, 
wandering  gentle  and  aimless  among  the  ways  of  Gali- 
lee and  the  streets  of  Jerusalem,  healing  the  sick  who 
came  in  his  way,  uttering  almost  at  random  parable  and 
sermon,  and  as  it  were  centring  interest,  all  through 
life,  in  that  death  by  which  he  was  to  redeem  his 
world,  must  yield  to  another  image :  that  of  a  man  of 
power,  inspired  by  one  permanent  relentless  purpose 
which  shapes  all  his  activities  of  word  and  deed.  In 
the  Gospels  we  confront  no  victim,  passively  await- 
ing martyrdom,  but  a  protagonist,  fighting  even  unto 
death  a  desperate  battle  to  insure  the  continuity  of 
such  a  purpose  in  the  world. 

The  purpose  of  Jesus  is  the  establishment  of  the 
Kingdom  of  Heaven  on  earth.  This  Kingdom  sug- 
gests a  social  utopia,  which  may  be  compared,  not 
of  course  in  economic  structure,  but  in  principles  in- 
volved and  modes  of  life  suggested,  with  any  other 

374 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


ideals  of  a  perfect  society,  from  Plato  to  More.  In 
particular,  it  may  to  our  great  profit  be  studied  in  re- 
lation to  the  moral  and  spiritual  aspects  probable  in 
the  socialist  state. 

The  central  importance  of  the  conception  of  the 
Kingdom  in  the  mind  of  Jesus  is  only  recently  receiv- 
ing adequate  recognition.  Here  is  the  one  continuous 
thread  carried  through  the  narrative.  With  the  glad 
tidings  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  he  opened  his  minis- 
try. The  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  epitome  of  his  early 
teaching,  begins  and  ends  with  the  Kingdom's  laws. 
The  homely  illustrations  of  the  parables  reveal  its  na- 
ture. Time  passes,  the  tone  of  the  teaching  alters,  and 
perspective  lengthens ;  but  through  changes  and  mis- 
conceptions the  "  note  "  of  the  Kingdom  persists.  The 
solemn  theme  is  stressed  even  at  the  Last  Supper ; 
and  after  the  tragedy  of  the  Cross,  it  is  given  by  the 
tradition  as  chief  subject  of  the  instructions  of  the 
Risen  Lord,  who  was  "  with  them  by  the  space  of 
forty  days,  speaking  the  things  concerning  the  King- 
dom of  God."  So  does  the  "  Social  Ideal "  irradiate 
the  story,  from  the  first  dawn  in  Galilee  to  the  light 
of  Eastertide. 

So  far  we  are  on  sure  ground.  When  we  ask,  how- 
ever, the  nature  of  this  conception,  so  salient  and  sig- 
nificant, we  enter  a  region  of  hot  controversy.  Was 
Jesus  of  that  apocalyptic  school  which  indulged  in 
wild  dreams  of  a  millennial  future,  mingled  with  fa- 
natical conspiracies  against  the  Roman  power?  Or  is 
this  suggestion,  so  marked  in  the  eschatological  dis- 

376 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

courses,  due  to  a  later  editing,  and  unfair  to  the  pure 
spiritual  ideals  of  the  Prophet  of  Nazareth?  Which 
represents  his  true  teaching,  —  the  Sermon  on  the 
Mount,  with  its  assumption  of  a  tranquil  society  where 
marriage,  law  courts,  and  other  homely  phenomena 
are  the  order  of  the  day,  or  the  visionary  ardors  and 
violent  denunciations  of  certain  chapters  in  Luke  and 
Matthew  ?  To  reply,  aji  understanding  of  national  con- 
ditions is  evidently  called  for ;  but  even  those  who 
possess  it  disagree.  The  gentle  ethical  teacher  and  the 
vehement  apocalyptic  prophet  are  opposed  as  rivals 
between  whom  Christendom  must  choose. 

That  choice  no  layman  is  equipped  to  make,  and 
any  discussion  of  the  problem  from  such  may  seem 
arrogant.  Yet  even  a  lay  intelligence,  honestly  bent 
on  the  texts,  and  daring  to  take  their  story  as  it  were 
at  face  value,  is  impelled  to  trust  its  own  impressions. 
And  it  can  hardly  fail  to  per.ceive  both  unity  and  se- 
quence, natural  as  they  are  dramatic,  in  the  evolution 
through  the  Gospels  of  the  Kingdom  idea. 

II 

What  did  Jesus  mean  by  the  Kingdom  of  God  ? 
Various  theories  have  deeply  affected  Christian  his- 
tory. Was  he  thinking  merely  of  the  power  of  the 
Spirit  to  evoke  in  the  individual  heart  love,  joy,  and 
peace  ?  —  a  personal,  wholly  inward  matter,  having  no 
direct  bearing  on  the  laws  of  collective  social  life  ? 
So  Protestantism  has  for  the  most  part  assumed.  Or, 
as  the  Roman  Church  steadily  claims,  was  his  concep- 

376 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


tion  rather  ecclesiastical?  Is  the  Kingdom  the  Church 
Catholic,  —  unrelated  to  the  political  or  economic 
order,  persisting  immutable  through  social  change, 
militant  on  earth,  triumphant  in  heaven,  composed  of 
those  born  again  in  the  mystical  waters  of  baptism 
and  nourished  by  the  Food  of  Immortality  ?  Or  was 
the  Idea  of  Jesus  different  from  either  of  these,  though 
involving  both  ?  Did  he  contemplate  as  he  talked  an 
actual  objective  society,  definite,  natural,  —  a  fellow- 
ship, realized  in  the  normal  order  of  everyday  life, 
inspired  from  above,  but  expressing  itself  quite  sim- 
ply through  social,  domestic,  and  civic  relations,  and 
having  no  concrete  existence  apart  from  them  ? 

If  this  last  be  the  true  conception,  another  question 
immediately  follows.  Was  this  Kingdom  of  Righteous- 
ness to  be  expected  on  earth  ?  Or  were  men  to  look 
for  it  only  in  an  Eternity  past  death  and  judgment 
when  the  Son  of  Man  should  return  in  glory  among 
the  clouds  of  heaven  ? 

Now,  if  we  take  Christ's  teaching  in  its  historical 
setting  we  are  forced  to  discard  the  Protestant  view 
at  once.  For  in  his  day  the  mention  of  the  Kingdom  I  ^ 
evoked  to  every  Jewish  breast  asocial  and  visible  con-  f 
ception.  The  idea  did  not  originate  with  him.  It  was 
the  creation  of  his  race,  product  of  long  years  of  exile 
and  anguish,  during  which  the  sorrowing  Jewish  mind 
had  found  strength  in  the  lofty  yearning  for  a  Holy 
Nation  where  those  severed  comrades,  Mercy  and 
Truth,  should  meet  together  and  Righteousness  and 
Peace  kiss  each  other  at  last.  The  yearning  was  inti- 

377 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

mately  connected  with  the  Messianic  hope.  It  dealt 
now  with  time,  now  with  eternity,  and  the  expres- 
sion of  it  in  its  later  phases  mingled  with  strange 
apocalyptic  dreams.  It  was  provincial  in  scope,  and 
breathed  at  times  the  longing  of  an  oppressed  people 
not  only  for  liberation  but  for  vengeance.  But  through 
it  always  pulsed  the  passionate  faith  in  a  social  order 
where  justice  and  righteousness  should  effectually  be 
attained. 

In  the  time  of  Christ,  this  idea  was  everywhere 
latent ;  he  took  it  up,  adopted  it,  indorsed  it.  What 
it  meant  may  be  seen  in  that  marvelous  song  ascribed 
to  the  Maid  Mary,  brooding  over  her  prevision  that 
of  the  Kingdom  of  the  Babe  she  was  to  bear  there 
should  be  no  end.  This  Kingdom  should  mean  the 
reign  of  justice  and  social  equality,  the  satisfaction 
of  the  hungry,  the  exaltation  of  the  poor,  while  the 
powerful  should  be  degraded  and  the  rich  sent  empty 
away.  It  is  probable  that  to  Mary  or  her  poet  thig 
hope  was  rather  national  than  social ;  none  the  less  did 
it  pertain  to  things  visible,  not  to  things  unseen.  The 
predecessor  of  Jesus,  that  picturesque  social  reformer, 
John  the  Baptist,  had  made  the  approaching  Kingdom 
the  burden  of  his  teaching.  That  teaching  has  a  dis- 
tinctly leveling  and  socialistic  note :  "  Every  valley 
shall  be  exalted  and  every  height  laid  low,"  had  been 
the  text  of  his  searching  and  practical  counsel,  ad- 
dressed to  political  employees  and  religious  leaders, 
to  soldiers  and  plain  folk. 

Jesus  formally  and  officially  indorsed  this  teaching 
378 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


and  made  it  his  own  starting-point.  In  two  great 
ways  he  illumined  and  enlarged  the  national  hope. 
His  great  and  original  contribution  to  the  Kingdom 
idea  is  his  emphasis  on  its  spirituality  and  inward- 
ness. Conventional  chronology  and  the  Fourth  Gospel 
suggest  that  even  before  he  took  up  the  theme  of  the 
Baptist,  he  had  said  to  slow,  learned  Nicodemus  that 
a  man  must  be  "  born  again  "  before  he  could  see  the 
Kingdom  of  God :  certainly,  he  preached  this  truth 
with  patience  to  the  end  of  his  life.  Again,  at  mid- 
career,  he  said  with  solemn  emphasis  that  the  King- 
dom should  be  taken  from  the  Jews,  and  that  men 
should  come  from  east  and  west  and  south  and  north 
to  sit  down  at  its  festival.  The  words  mark  an  epoch 
in  human  thought.  All  the  more  striking,  in  view  of 
this  deep  double  transformation  of  the  Jewish  ideal, 
is  the  fact  that  Jesus  never  discourages  the  fixed  be- 
lief of  his  hearers  that  the  Kingdom  is  a  substantial 
social  and  visible  reality.  If  his  social  teaching  con- 
sistently presupposes  the  spiritual  and  personal,  so 
does  the  personal  find  actuality  only  in  the  outward 
and  social.  Had  Jesus  wished  to  supplant  the  social 
idea  current  in  his  time  by  the  idea  of  a  reign  of  the 
Spirit  within  the  heart,  he  could  hardly  have  chosen 
a  phrase  that  would  have  involved  his  hearers  in  so 
grave  a  misconception;  certainly  none  that  should 
cost  him  so  dear.  However  he  modifies  crude  con- 
temporary ideas,  he  ratifies  the  faith  of  his  people 
that  a  visible  society,  holy  unto  the  Lord,  is  the  ideal 
for  which  they  are  to  work  and  pray.  His  teaching 

379 


THE  FUTURE  OF  EELIGION 

consistently  aims  to  create  not  mystics  nor  recluses, 
but  brothers.1 

Nor,  if  we  reject  the  sentimental  idea  of  the  indi- 
vidualist, can  we  any  more  truly  limit  the  thought  of 
Jesus  to  an  ecclesiastical  system.  From  the  time  of 
Ezekiel,  the  ecclesiastical  note  had  been  stressed  in 
Hebrew  thought.  Jesus,  who  never  discarded  any  true 
or  vital  insight  of  the  past,  fused  this  idea  with  his 
conception.  It  is  also  obvious  that  he  worked  deliber- 
ately to  provide  for  the  permanence  of  the  life  he  came 
to  impart,  through  training  and  consecrating  a  special 
body  of  followers.  Nevertheless,  the  broader  teaching 
concerning  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  cannot  be  held 
within  the  church  idea.  During  those  early  months 
of  teaching  in  Galilee,  the  thought  of  the  Kingdom  is 
large  as  the  liberal  air :  intimate  study  of  later  phases 
makes  clear  that  the  Church  is  never  to  be  an  end  in 
itself.  It  is  conceived  as  the  instrument  of  the  King- 
dom, or  if  Kingdom  and  Church  are  ideally  one,  the 
Church  is  no  mere  mystical  society  living  its  hidden  life 
independent  of  normal  relations ;  it  is  humanity  turned 
Godward,  controlled  in  its  natural  necessary  pursuits 
by  the  Spirit  of  the  Master. 

m 

We  are  then  pressed  back  on  the  third  or  social 

conception.  And  in  truth  it  is  central  and  intentional 

in  all  the  teachings  of  the  prophet  from  Nazareth: 

so  obviously  both  foundation  and  framework  of  the 

1  See  Kauschenbusch,  Christianity  and  the  Social  Crisis. 

380 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


Sermon  on  the  Mount  that,  were  it  not  for  the  lapse  of 
this  conception  at  an  early  date  from  Christian  con- 
sciousness, it  would  seem  impossible  that  critics  like 
Mill,  Mazzini,  and  others  should  ever  have  accused 
Christianity  of  an  individualistic  bent.  Without  the 
social  assumption,  the  counsels  to  the  individual  are 
not  only  paradoxical,  but,  as  we  have  seen  already, 
exasperating.  The  ideal  is  a  fellowship,  and  only  in  a 
fellowship  can  the  counsels  be  obeyed.  The  effort  to 
construe  the  teaching  otherwise  has  landed  generations 
of  Christians  in  unreality  or  despair. 

The  Sermon  opens  with  that  great  series  of  para- 
doxes known  as  the JBeatitudes,  describing  the  qualities 
of  the  citizens  of  the  Kingdom.  We  have  dwelt  on 
these  in  an  earlier  stage  of  our  discussion. 

Having  described  the  citizens  the  Discourse  pro- 
ceeds in  well-indicated  divisions  to  state  the  collective 
principles  which  they  are  to  observe. 

First,  they  are  to  be  conspicuous.  Far  from  hiding 
their  light  modestly,  they  are  to  let  it  shine  before 
men,  that  their  good  works  may  be  seen  and  God  be 
glorified.  It  is  a  disconcerting  passage  to  those  who 
feel  that  humility  and  laziness  combine  to  enjoin  the 
apologetic  disguise  of  their  virtues.  The  irritated  anger 
of  the  world  against  pushing  religion  to  extremes  unites 
with  a  natural  distaste  for  being  peculiar  to  make  many 
a  Christian  limit  the  expression  of  the  Beatitudes  in  so- 
ciety and  business  to  the  innocuous  good  nature  and 
pleasant  bearing  consistent  with  a  decorous  conven- 
tional career.  There,  however,  is  the  command:  and 

381 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

though  we  belittle  and  degrade  it  by  mumbling  it  in 
church  when  the  collection  is  taken  up,  it  stands  ob- 
stinately, clinching  for  all  time  the  plain  intention  of 
Christ,  that  the  society  which  obeys  him  shall  be  a 
city  set  on  the  hill,  before  the  eyes  of  men,  and  from 
that  eminence  shining  as  the  light  of  the  whole  world. 

The  next  principle  is  no  less  significant :  for  Jesus 
goes  on  to  warn  men  that  all  the  moral  precepts  of 
the  past  are  to  be  fulfilled,  not  destroyed.  Any  one 
who  ignores  the  least  point  in  them  will  be  the  least 
in  the  Kingdom.  People  pay  no  attention  to  this  re- 
mark and  act  as  if  Law  and  Prophets  had  no  importance 
for  us  nowadays.  But  Christ's  troubled  emphasis  gains 
cogency  when  we  reflect  what  his  Hebraic  background 
implies.  The  passion  for  social  justice  was  fundamental 
in  it.  An  aristocratic  respect  for  the  rights  of  property 
inspired  that  Roman  law  under  the  tradition  of  which 
we  are  still  living.  In  sharp  contrast,  as  Rauschenbusch 
points  out,  the  whole  trend  of  the  Hebraic  law  was  to- 
ward social  equality  and  the  protection  of  the  rights 
of  the  poor.  As  for  the  Prophets  the  case  is  clear. 
That  ideal  of  personal  holiness  which  rose  late,  after 
the  Exile,  supplemented  but  never  superseded  the 
great  vision  of  national  and  civic  righteousness  which 
is  as  distinctly  the  contribution  of  Judaea  to  the  world 
as  the  ideal  of  the  good,  intelligent,  and  beautiful  in- 
dividual is  the  contribution  of  Greece. 

The  fulfillment  of  the  Law  involved  its  penetration 
to  the  innermost  springs  of  conduct.  Social  justice  can 
be  achieved  and  equal  opportunity  preserved,  Jesus 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


teaches,  only  through  the  transformation  of  the  human 
heart.  He  fulfills  by  spiritualizing.  The  Sermon  is 
deeply  and  intimately  personal,  for  only  a  humanity 
born  "  from  within "  can  sustain  a  regenerate  state. 
But  to  construe  this  stress  on  the  personal  life  into  in- 
difference to  the  social  whole,  and  to  think  that  one 
loves  one's  neighbor  as  one's  self  and  fulfills  the  Law 
by  an  attitude  of  passive  amiability  toward  the  world 
and  ardent  tenderness  toward  one's  family,  is  strangely 
to  misread  the  Master's  mind.  Life  in  the  society  he 
contemplates  has  its  wellspring  in  the  heart ;  but  the 
waters  are  to  flow  forth  for  the  healing  of  the  nations. 

For  again  we  must  note  the  full  social  completeness 
of  the  life  presupposed.  The  searching  power  of  the 
words  of  Christ  as  he  speaks  of  purity  and  fellowship 
has  never  ceased  to  pierce  the  vital  parts  like  swift 
shafts  of  light.  But  these  words  concern  marriage,  go- 
ing to  law,  showing  hospitality.  None  are  addressed 
to  men  withdrawn  in  seclusion.  Their  point  and  pith 
is  that  they  contemplate  a  humanity  going  about  its 
usual  business,  and  insist  that  an  absolute  ideal  of 
brotherliness  shall  control  this  business.  There  is  con- 
stant stress  on  ideals  of  service  and  brotherhood, 
which  can  only  be  carried  out  in  a  highly  evolved  so- 
ciety. In  the  recorded  sayings  of  Jesus  it  is  hard  to 
find  the  slightest  justification  for  the  modern  conten- 
tion that  he  belonged  to  the  school  of  the  Essenes. 

The  reason  for  this  impression,  however,  and  for 
the  frequent  assumption  that  Jesus  at  heart  sanctioned 
an  almost  Oriental  withdrawal  from  life,  is  found  in 

383 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

the  astonishing  force  of  the  sayings  that  plead  for 
what  we  may  call  Detachment.  No  ascetic  of  the  desert 
ever  spoke  in  one  way  more  strongly  than  Jesus.  A 
distressed  dread  of  private  property,  a  conviction  that 
it  is  positively  safer  as  well  as  more  blessed  to  be 
without  it,  is  an  obstinately  persistent  strain  in  his 
teaching.  Woe  is  proclaimed  to  rich  people.  Posses- 
sions are  described  as  subject  to  theft  and  corruption, 
wholly  insecure :  they  justify  —  note  the  accuracy  of 
the  verb  —  in  the  sight  of  men,  but  are  an  abomination 
in  the  sight  of  God.  \Ve  are  distinctly  bidden  not  to 
seek  or  accumulate  them,  and  are  told  that  it  is  all 
but  impossible  for  a  rich  man  even  to  enter  that  social 
utopia,  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven.  The  three  things  that 
choke  the  "\Vord  of  God  in  a  heart  not  indisposed  nor 
unfertile  are,  first,  the  pleasures,  then  the  cares  of  this 
world,  —  where  is  keener  analysis  ?  —  and  finally, 
riches,  stigmatized  in  one  sharp  word,  —  deceitful. 

This  is  plain  speaking,  nor  can  we  wonder  if  the 
disciples  were  astonished  at  it  and  asked  who  then 
could  be  saved.  Yet  all  the  time  it  is  blended  with 
the  social  assumption.  The  Sermon  ends  as  it  began, 
with  the  theme  of  the  Kingdom.  A  certain  attitude  is 
enjoined,  or,  to  speak  perhaps  better,  permitted :  Judge 
not,  that  we  be  not  judged.  And  the  last  stress  is  then 
placed  on  conduct  as  the  only  passport  of  the  citizen. 
Only  he  who  "  does  "  that  Will  of  the  Father  which 
the  Discourse  has  explained  shall  enter  the  Kingdom 
of  Heaven. 

Historical  conditions  and  the  play  of  Oriental  in- 
384 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


fluences  during  the  formative  period  of  Christianity 
account  in  a  measure  for  the  extraordinary  mediaeval 
misunderstanding  which  construed  the  teaching  of 
Christ  in  a  separatist  and  individualistic  sense.  But 
there  was  a  more  permanent  reason.  We  have  seen 
that  no  civilization  based  on  social  inequality  has  ever 
been  able  to  conceive  such  a  degree  of  detachment 
from  worldly  care  as  he  sternly  enjoins,  unless 
through  an  ascetic  retirement.  The  imagination  of  the 
past  simply  could  not  compass  his  thought.  Yet  the 
teaching  about  unworklliness  could  not  be  passed  over 
by  honest  minds :  and  so  it  came  to  pass  that  the 
people  who  tried  to  take  the  Gospels,  not  in  the  free 
and  easy  manner  of  the  average  sentimentalist,  but  in 
sincerity  and  truth,  came  falsely  to  fancy  that  Christ 
when  he  talked  of  the  Kingdom  was  contemplating, 
not  a  leaven  that  should  work  in  the  social  lump  till 
the  whole  be  leavened,  not  the  ideal  of  a  righteous 
society  which  his  every  word  would  suggest  to  his 
Jewish  hearers,  but  a  number  of  regenerate  individ- 
uals unable  to  express  the  love  within  them  through 
their  business  relations  and  therefore  struggling  in 
painful  isolation  to  achieve  a  lonely  perfection  sur- 
rounded by  an  immutable  and  hostile  world. 

We  need  dwell  on  only  one  point  in  the  early  par- 
ables concerning  the  Kingdom  ;  but  it  is  a  point  of 
primary  importance.  Almost  all  the  images  are  taken 
from  living  growth.  The  sown  field,  the  mustard  tree, 
expanding  from  a  tiny  atom  of  organic  life  till  the 
birds  take  shelter  in  its  branches,  the  seed  growing 

385 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

secretly,  unguessed  by  those  who  tread  the  soil  be- 
neath which  the  miracle  of  germination  goes  on,  the 
leaven,  —  also  a  living  organism,  —  these  are  the 
homely,  vital  parallels  used  to  suggest  the  advance  of 
the  Kingdom  of  God.  This  constant  reversal  to  fig- 
ures and  metaphors  of  growth  shows  the  ever-present 
sense  of  process  —  the  evolutionary  nature,  to  use  the 
modern  phrase  —  of  Jesus'  conception. 

The  picture  of  a  society,  to  be  gradually  realized, 
in  which  fighting  for  one's  rights  is  to  be  abolished, 
and  physical  necessities  are  to  be  "  added  unto  us  " 
while  we  think  first  of  the  communal  whole  and  its 
righteousness  and  take  no  thought  for  the  morrow, 
has  always  charmed ;  it  has  always,  as  we  know,  been 
dismissed  with  a  sigh.  Nor  can  we  wonder  if  thinking 
men,  under  prevalent  industrial  conditions,  have  seen 
in  it  simply  a  denial  of  the  will  to  live.  Yet  to-day, 
thousands  in  every  country  are  awakening  to  effective 
belief  in  this  very  picture,  for  it  is  the  picture  of  the 
socialist  state.  Careless  of  Jesus'  teachings  though 
most  socialists  may  be,  the  civilization  they  work  for, 
with  its  equality  of  economic  opportunity,  its  law  of 
non-resistance  and  its  protection  of  the  individual  from 
fear,  bears  the  same  relation  which  body  bears  to  soul 
to  the  social  ideal  enjoined  by  the  Master. 

IV 

Before  we  answer  the  final  question,  whether  the 
Kingdom  belongs  to  time  or  to  eternity,  we  must  ap- 
proach more  closely  the  development  of  Jesus'  thought. 

386 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


We  find  two  widely  differing  types  of  utterance, 
corresponding  to  successive  periods  in  his  career. 
The  earlier  is  represented  by  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
and  the  closely  related  series  of  parables.  The  later 
centres  in  those  eschatological  discourses  so  ignored  at 
certain  times  in  church  history,  so  all  but  insanely 
stressed  at  others,  and  in  our  own  day  so  vivid  a  centre 
of  critical  uncertainties. 

There  is  a  dramatic  change  of  tone  between  the 
earlier  and  the  later  portion  of  Jesus'  life.  Probably 
the  common  people  have  never  in  the  course  of  history 
been  privileged  to  experience  such  joy  as  filled  their 
hearts  in  the  first  days  of  the  Galilean  teaching. 
Jesus  was  happy  himself ;  that  happiness  fills  the  re- 
cord. In  the  later  period,  joy  has  vanished ;  stern 
cautions  take  its  place.  Those  who  ask  to  sit  on 
either  side  of  him  in  his  Kingdom  receive  a  sad 
reply,  bidding  them  share  his  cup  of  anguish.  Ever 
clearer,  ever  nearer,  the  Cross  rises  before  our  eyes. 
The  Kingdom  is  not  forgotten,  but  it  shines  now  be- 
yond that  Cross,  beyond  the  present  age,  in  far-reced- 
ing glory.  The  King  has  gone  into  a  distant  land,  his 
subjects  are  to  occupy  till  he  come.  All  the  virgins,  wise 
and  foolish,  succumb  to  slumber  while  they  wait ;  but 
the  central  command  rings  clear :  "  Watch  therefore, 
for  ye  know  not  at  what  hour  your  Lord  shall  come." 
This  coming  shall  be  a  judgment.  After  the  cumu- 
lative distress  of  nations  has  caused  men's  hearts  to 
fail  in  fear,  suddenly,  awfully,  the  Sign  of  the  Son  of 
Man  shall  appear  in  the  heavens.  There  shall  be  a 

387 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

great  winnowing  of  the  gathered  peoples,  and  the  test 
will  be  no  dogmatic  loyalty  nor  mystical  emotion  but 
the  plainest  fulfillment  of  social  duty.  The  gospel  of 
the  Kingdom  meantime  shall  have  been  preached  in 
the  whole  world,  and  after  the  judgment  the  Kingdom 
shall  shine  forth  clear. 

Critics  bid  us  reject  either  the  early  or  the  later 
type  of  teaching  as  unauthentic.  Surely  the  demand  is 
strange !  Any  imaginative  reader  sees  that  each  type 
is  wholly  natural  at  the  precise  point  where  it  appears. 
Glance  at  the  circumstances.  In  the  outset  Jesus  had 
rejected  in  the  desert  the  temptation  native  to  the  im- 
petuous idealist,  to  save  society  by  hasty  or  spectac- 
ular means.  But  society  could  not  understand  him. 
The  misapprehension  grew  as  the  power  of  his  word 
became  greater.  In  mid-life,  he  had  to  flee  the  ex- 
cited crowds  who  sought  to  make  him  king.  Fancy 
likes  to  dwell  on  what  would  have  happened  had  these 
succeeded.  They  would  have  ushered  in  the  noblest 
social  experiment  history  has  seen :  yet  it  would  have 
presented  a  sad  travesty  of  the  vision  of  the  seer.  The 
desire  to  force  on  violent  and  political  lines  that  so- 
cial development  which  must  be  preceded  by  psycholo- 
gical change  has  been  the  tragedy  of  many  a  reformer 
besides  Jesus.  It  drove  him  to  a  change  in  method 
and  to  a  new  reserve.  He  altered  the  whole  tone  of 
his  teaching  and  turned  from  public  instruction  to  the 
training  of  a  small  group.  The  disciples  were  still  sent 
forth  with  the  message  of  the  Kingdom,  but  with  un- 
relenting plainness  the  disaffected  people  were  made 

388 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


to  understand  that  this  Kingdom  could  never  be  at- 
tained by  political  means  and  would  never  fulfill  their 
provincial  hopes. 

As  this  perception  came  confusedly  home  to  the 
Jews,  all  hope  of  external  success  in  the  plans  of 
Jesus  was  destroyed.  Prototype  of  many  reformers, 
he  saw  the  people  fall  away  from  him  because  he 
refused  political  power,  while  the  authorities  were 
hounding  him  to  death  on  the  ground  that  he  sought 
it.  Facing  Calvary,  his  purpose  was  not  weakened, 
but  his  expectation  of  fulfillment  was  deferred.  The 
eschatological  discourses  are  doubtless  colored  by  edi- 
torial memories  of  the  first  century.  But  that  Jesus, 
familiar  as  he  must  have  been  with  popular  apoca- 
lyptic literature,  did  look  beyond  his  own  day  and 
project  the  Messianic  reign  and  the  victory  of  the 
Kingdom  into  a  millennial  future,  no  simple-minded 
reader  of  the  Gospels  can  question. 

Yet  the  new  emphasis  is  not  inconsistent  with  the 
old.  The  Sermon  on  the  Mount  itself  had  ended  with 
prediction  of  a  judgment  to  come.  In  these  later 
teachings,  judgment,  so  to  speak,  occupies  the  centre 
of  the  stage,  but  it  inaugurates  a  kingdom  which  is 
still  to  be  on  earth.  The  Jewish  hope,  we  must  re- 
member, had  originally  dwelt  not  on  heaven  as  we  use 
the  phrase,  but  rather  on  the  reign  of  Messiah  over 
men  in  the  body,  in  some  mystic  age  to  be.  The 
Millennium  was  the  social  utopia  of  the  Jews,  and 
was  conceived  in  some  ways  very  practically.  Jesus  en- 
larged this  hope  beyond  mere  national  boundaries; 

389 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

but  he  clung  to  it  till  the  end.  Over  all  the  teaching 
of  both  periods  shines  the  great  Petition  which  rises 
still  from  the  heart  of  Christendom :  Thy  Kingdom 
come  on  earth. 

To  this  coming  of  the  Son  of  Man,  however,  catas- 
trophe is  now  seen  as  a  necessary  introduction.  The 
progress  of  the  Kingdom  had  been  treated  as  the 
gentlest  of  natural  growths.  Now  the  point  of  view 
has  changed,  and  the  Kingdom  is  to  be  ushered  in  by 
convulsion  and  crisis.  The  destruction  of  nations,  the 
upheaval  of  nature,  the  strange  invasion  of  time  by 
eternity,  are  its  precursors. 

This  element  in  Christ's  teaching  has  been  evaded 
and  forgotten  :  when  noted,  it  has  led  often  to  strange 
bewilderments.  Yet  is  it  not  profoundly  true  to  fact? 
Mingled  with  contemporary  reminiscences  and  illustra- 
tions, these  later  teachings  contain  solemn  recognition 
of  an  essential  and  permanent  principle  in  all  social 
progress.  It  is  the  correlate  to  the  principle  stressed 
in  the  earlier  teaching.  Evolutionary  ideas  control  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount :  later,  the  great  mind  of  Jesus 
faced  the  necessity  of  revolution.  The  Kingdom  is 
planted  like  a  seed  and  like  a  seed  grows  secretly.  But 
in  its  advance  there  is  another  aspect,  and  Christ  gives 
us  the  clear  and  fearless  statement  that  in  a  dislocated 
and  imperfect  world  not  only  must  growth  be  fostered, 
but  catastrophe  must  be  watched  for  and  welcomed. 
Judgment  as  well  as  progress  is  essential  to  the  further- 
ance of  the  Kingdom  of  God.  It  takes  the  world  a  long 
time  to  learn  this  lesson.  Social  theorists  constantly 

390 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


slur  one  of  the  principles  or  shrink  from  the  other. 
Calm,  patient  minds  despise  and  fear  the  advocates  of 
catastrophe :  temperaments  prone  to  disregard  the  slow 
travail  of  the  ages  continually  press  for  revolutionary 
methods.  Only  now  and  then  a  man  like  Prince  Kro- 
potkin  quietly  calls  history  to  witness  to  the  apparent 
necessity  of  revolutionary  crises  in  all  sound  evolution- 
ary advance.  The  all-comprehending  thought  of  Jesus 
grew  to  include  both  elements,  held  them  in  perfect 
balance,  and  bequeathed  them  to  the  gradual  appre- 
hension of  his  followers  as  the  slow,  sure  lessons  of 
history  should  be  learned. 

And  clear  beyond  slow  process  and  sudden  crisis 
lies  the  complete  fulfillment  of  the  ancient  hope. 
Judgment  is  no  mere  solemn  conclusion  to  the  present 
age:  it  is  an  episode,  introducing  a  new  era.  The 
climax  of  the  eschatological  discourses  is  found  in  the 
splendid  words:  "  Then  shall  the  righteous  shine  forth 
as  the  sun  in  the  Kingdom  of  my  Father."  In  this 
promise  culminates  the  ideal  that  strengthens  and  in- 
forms the  whole  teaching  of  Christ.  The  Kingdom  of 
God  is  the  goal  of  history !  The  thought  gives  the  clue 
to  all  Christian  duty.  By  the  last  command,  as  re- 
corded in  the  tradition,  the  disciples  are  to  preach  the 
gospel  of  this  Kingdom  through  all  the  world.  For 
its  coming  on  earth  they  are  steadfastly  to  watch  and 
pray.  They  must  labor  for  it  "  till  he  come,"  in  feed- 
ing the  hungry,  visiting  the  sick,  caring  for  those  in 
prison,  and  in  fulfilling  those  Beatitudes  which,  as  we 
have  seen,  imply  not  haphazard  emotion  but  regulated 

391 


THE  FUTUKE  OF  KELIGION 

social  action.  Jesus  was  infinitely  patient,  for  he  was 
well  aware  that  only  secret  change  working  slowly, 
from  within  out,  could  produce  the  society  of  his 
desires.  He  was  infinitely  courageous,  for  he  did  not 
shrink  from  predicting  the  awful  destruction  of  all 
conventional  security  before  the  triumphant  ideal  could 
shine  forth  as  the  sun  in  its  strength.  There  are 
mystical  and  spiritual  elements  in  his  inexhaustible 
teaching  on  which  we  have  not  touched :  they  carry 
the  vision  behind  the  visible  world,  to  a  plane  of  being 
concerning  which  the  sociologist  is  silent.  But  none 
of  these  elements  invalidate  the  precision  of  his  out- 
look over  the  alternation  of  gradual  growth  and  sud- 
den catastrophe  by  which,  on  the  human  and  visible 
side,  social  transformation  must  be  attained. 


Jesus  is,  then,  as  suggestively  near  to  the  modern 
socialist  in  his  view  of  method  as  we  have  seen  him 
to  be  in  his  social  ideal.  His  thought  may  well  be  said 
to  wait  through  the  ages  for  social  and  economic  evolu- 
tion to  catch  up  with  it.  Its  marvelous  inclusiveness 
is  its  strength  in  the  long  run,  but  it  prevents  him 
from  being  fully  apprehended  by  any  one  generation. 

There  is  an  interesting  parallel  between  those  Jew- 
ish ideas  which  consistently  opposed  and  finally  killed 
him,  and  the  cruder  socialist  schools.  The  Jews  had 
their  own  type  of  economic  determinism.  There  were 
plenty  of  materialistic  fatalists  among  them  ;  plenty  of 
people  who  sought  to  impose  the  social  change  violently 

392 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


from  without  instead  of  fostering  it  quietly  from 
within.  There  were  also  others  who,  shrinking  from 
cataclysm,  saw  no  alternative  but  inaction.  Class-con- 
sciousness and  the  doctrine  of  the  class-struggle  have 
moreover  close  analogue  in  the  haughty  race-feeling  of 
the  Jews,  and  their  jealous  belief  that  of  them  only 
came  salvation.  Now,  Jesus  did  not  wholly  deny  any 
of  these  ideas ;  he  repudiated  only  what  was  exclusive 
and  partial  in  their  emphasis.  He  saw,  as  we  must  learn 
to  see,  that  idealism  is  worth  nothing  unless  it  trans- 
late' itself  into  tangible  social  progress  and  express 
itself  in  positive  terms  of  human  relationship ;  his  faith 
in  the  sacramental  unity  of  body  and  spirit  taught 
him  that  such  progress  must  largely  come  from  the 
natural  urge  of  life ;  he  believed  in  action  as  in  pa- 
tience. Again,  his  thought  transcended  all  barriers  of 
race,  as  it  transcended  those  barriers  of  class  which 
had  imprisoned  even  the  mind  of  Plato ;  and  he  re- 
jected the  race-feeling  of  the  Jews,  as  we  cannot  doubt 
that  he  would  to-day  reject  what  is  false  and  bitter  in 
class-consciousness  ;  yet  he  respected  and  retained  the 
vital  element  in  the  national  pride.  In  his  plan  the 
Jews  were  truly  the  Chosen  People,  the  chief  instru- 
ment through  whom  the  religion  of  the  world  should 
be  renewed.  Why,  then,  should  he  have  shrunk  to-day 
from  hailing  the  proletariat  as  leaders  toward  social 
freedom,  and  welcoming  the  class-struggle,  so  far  as 
a  high  idealism  suffuses  it,  as  the  destined  instrument 
for  the  abolition  of  classes  ? 

The  Jews  put  Jesus  to  death.  It  was  his  own  who 
393 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

rejected  him,  —  the  men  of  faith,  the  men  of  an  ideal. 
Intent  on  asserting  a  part  to  be  the  whole,  they  con- 
spired with  the  Romans,  who  had  no  ideal  at  all,  in 
opposition  to  the  man  who  held  all  ideals  together ; 
and  Pilate  condemns  reluctantly  him  whom  the  rabbis 
denounce  with  howling  rage.  History  repeats  itself, 
and  it  is  never  the  erroneous  so  much  as  the  partial 
enthusiasm  which  hates  the  more  synthetic  and  pro- 
found. Jesus  understood  this  well.  Therefore  the  Cross 
held  its  place  in  the  evolution  of  the  Kingdom,  and 
holds  that  place  to-day.  But  it  rises  not  at  the  end 
but  in  the  middle  of  the  drama.  Jesus  placed  it  at  its 
true  historic  point  when  he  environed  his  followers 
with  eternity,  insisting  at  the  same  time  that  the  far- 
thest fulfillment  of  his  dream  of  brotherhood  in  an 
eternal  future  was  no  mere  phantom  nor  promise  of 
heavenly  consolation  for  the  individual,  but  a  kingdom 
of  effective  justice  to  be  possessed  on  earth  by  bodily 
men. 

To  claim  Jesus  as  a  socialist  in  the  modern  sense 
is  a  sentimental  fallacy.  His  words  could  in  the  nature 
of  things  take  no  account  of  the  economic  forces  which 
must  bring  about  socialism,  as  every  other  social  change. 
But  he  planted  in  the  heart  of  the  world  an  ideal, 
unfulfilled  but  never  forgotten,  which  bears  a  subtly 
intimate  relation  to  each  successive  stage  of  social 
progress  ;  nor  shall  we  be  wrong  if  we  say  that  each 
stage  is  nearer  to  it  than  the  last.  In  some  fundamen- 
tal respects  modern  conditions  have  released  for  the 
first  time  the  power  of  his  ideal.  Cruelly  individual- 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


istic  though  democracy  has  been  in  its  earlier  phases, 
miserably  though  self-government  up  to  date  has  failed 
in  politics,  we  still  believe  that  the  chief  democratic 
achievement,  the  assertion  of  the  dignity  of  the  indi- 
vidual, is  worth  all  it  has  cost.  This  assertion  is  the 
very  starting-point  of  the  faith  and  method  of  Jesus; 
and  it  is  also  the  starting-point  of  the  socialistic  belief 
in  the  wise  power  of  the  common  will.  It  is  safe  to  say 
that  as  democracy  becomes  socialized,  its  economic 
forms,  result  of  this  will,  must  for  the  first  time  work 
in  harmony  with  the  deeper  teaching  of  the  Gospels. 

VI 

The  idea  of  the  Kingdom  was  never  lost,  but  it 
faded  from  the  present  age.  We  can  see  that  the  early 
Church  held  to  it  for  a  time,  for  in  the  book  of  the 
Acts  of  the  Apostles  it  is  mentioned  again  and  again 
as  the  burden  of  apostolic  teaching.  In  the  Pauline 
Epistles,  however,  it  has  already  dropped  almost  en- 
tirely out  of  sight,  or,  to  speak  more  correctly,  has 
disintegrated,  retaining  two  of  its  elements.  These  ele- 
ments have  grandeur  and  life-giving  power.  One  ia 
that  conception,  so  essentially  Pauline,  of  the  Church, 
the  Mystical  Body  of  the  Lord.  In  Paul's  treatment, 
the  conception  retains  much  of  the  beauty  and  moral 
stringency  of  the  Kingdom-idea  ;  yet  much  is  lost  from 
the  breadth  and  penetration  of  the  thought  of  Jesus, 
to  whom,  as  we  have  seen,  the  Church  was  rather  in- 
strument than  end.  The  other  element  corresponds  to 
the  later  teaching  of  the  Master :  it  is  that  constant 

395 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

expectation  of  a  Parousia,  a  swift  second  coming  of 
the  Lord  in  glory,  which  dominated  the  first  age  of 
Christianity  and  sustained  the  early  Christians,  through 
all  persecution  at  the  hand  of  the  Roman  Empire, 
with  a  millennial  hope  of  which  the  fulfillment  was 
all  but  immediately  expected.  In  different  ways  these 
two  conceptions  of  the  Church  and  the  Parousia  have 
been  central  and  vital  through  Christian  history :  but 
they  have  remained  separated. 

In  the  other  chief  document  of  the  early  Church, 
that  strange  book  the  Apocalypse,  the  same  separa- 
tion is  evident.  Yet  through  all  the  play  of  Hebrew 
symbol,  we  seem  to  discern  here  an  ideal  nearer  than 
Paul's  to  that  of  Jesus.  For  the  writer  foresees  a 
new  earth  as  well  as  a  new  heaven.  He  is  intensely 
preoccupied  with  the  actual  facts  of  history.  The 
mystical  drama  which  the  book  presents  is  the  pro- 
jection of  these  facts  on  the  spiritual  plane.  It  is  a 
book,  says  the  Rev.  D.  S.  Cairns,1  "resonant  with 
the  great  voices  of  history,"  "  the  cry  of  the  Christian 
heart,  harassed,  burdened,  and  tortured  by  the  pres- 
sure of  the  Roman  Empire,  for  a  Christian  environ- 
ment," "  the  expression  of  revolt  against  a  worn-out 
world-order,  a  civilization  of  custom,  armament  and 
law."  The  thought  of  the  Church  and  the  thought  of 
the  Parousia  are  both  present,  but  they  unite  to  gener- 
ate a  hope  of  social  redemption  here  on  earth  which 
is  not  far  from  the  Master's  Vision.  That  Jerusalem 
which  is  above  is  no  mere  heavenly  city  safely  en- 

1  Christianity  in  the  Modern  World  :  Hodder  &  Stoughton. 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


sconced  in  eternity.  It  is  beheld  forever  coming  down 
to  abide  on  earth,  with  its  four  even  walls,  the  type 
of  equity,  its  gates  through  which  all  the  peoples  of 
the  world  shall  pass,  its  Tree  of  Life  whereof  the 
leaves  are  for  the  healing  of  the  nations.  Among  all 
the  dreams  of  an  ideal  future  with  which  literature 
is  rich  there  is  no  greater  social  document  than  the 
Apocalypse  attributed  of  old  to  the  apostle  of  the  inner 
life. 

The  Vision  was  too  great  for  succeeding  generations 
to  compass  or  understand.  The  result  in  history  of 
the  shrinking  of  the  idea  of  the  Kingdom  into  two 
only  of  its  component  parts  is  well  known.  The  ecclesi- 
astical narrowness  entailed  too  often  in  the  first  and 
the  fantastic  eccentricities  resultant  on  the  second 
were  due  to  the  failure  to  unite  them  both  in  the 
broader  ideal  of  the  Founder.  On  the  one  hand, 
Europe  developed  a  church  organization  where  the 
social  ideal,  though  never  quite  obscured,  was  at  best 
tragically  blurred  and  misread,  and  which  at  its  worst 
encouraged  the  elect  to  flee  into  cloister  or  desert, 
leaving  the  world  to  go  on  its  weary  way  unredeemed. 
On  the  other,  that  great  hope  of  the  final  victory  of 
justice  through  cataclysm  and  anguish  lost  its  hold, 
or  else  was  spasmodically  revived  in  hysterical  and 
fantastic  forms  unrelated  to  the  real  progress  of  his- 
tory. Meantime  Christianity  as  a  whole  underwent  an 
individualistic  change  ;  it  retained  immense  potency  to 
inspire  and  purify  the  private  heart,  but  lost  all  im- 
pulse to  sustain  an  all-embracing  social  hope.  That 

397 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

hope  was  transferred  to  a  heaven  beyond  the  wars  of 
earth  and  the  realities  of  the  flesh,  and  perfection  was 
pictured  not  in  the  terms  of  that  natural,  living,  eager 
society  so  tenderly  imaged  by  Jesus,  but  by  rows  of 
solemn  saints  standing  at  gaze  in  perpetual  isolation, 
related  only  by  a  dreary  monotony  of  pose  and  ges- 
ture. The  heavenly  Jerusalem  itself  became  as  it  were 
individualized,  shunted  firmly  back  into  eternity,  and 
regarded  mainly  as  a  comforting  vision  for  the  mourner 
and  the  blase. 

How  impoverished,  how  partial,  the  ideas  most 
operative  in  Christian  history  appear  when  placed  be- 
side the  rich  ideal  of  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  as  it 
lay  in  the  mind  of  Jesus !  Economic  expansion  and 
racial  progress  have  at  last  in  the  fullness  of  time 
brought  us  to  the  point  where  we  may  recover  that 
ideal  if  we  will.  Behind  us  lie  the  great  doctrinal 
age,  the  great  liturgical  age,  and  the  age  preoccupied 
with  personal  religion.  All  had  their  necessary  tasks 
in  the  evolution  of  the  Christian  consciousness,  nor 
was  the  order  of  these  tasks  without  meaning.  The  first 
duty  of  the  Church  was  through  the  councils  of  the 
first  centuries,  to  formulate  the  revelation  latent  in  the 
depths  of  her  heart,  of  the  relations  of  man  to  the 
Eternal.  Doctrine  was  never  afterward  lost  to  sight ; 
but  during  the  Middle  Ages  it  was  given  her  to  con- 
tinue and  amplify  another  work :  the  expression  of 
corporate  religious  passion  through  her  glorious  art 
of  worship.  This  work,  too,  was  never  superseded  ; 
but  the  generations  passed,  and  a  reaction  from  formal 


THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 


religion,  a  deepening  of  the  individual  life,  became 
called  for.  The  Reformation  accomplished  its  appointed 
task.  It  isolated  man  and  his  Maker.  At  the  dawn 
of  the  epoch  which  was  to  penetrate  with  new  awe  and 
freedom  the  secrets  of  personality,  it  brought  out  into 
fuller  light  than  any  earlier  age  the  unescapable  ne- 
cessity of  private  judgment  and  the  subjective  element 
in  religion. 

Nothing  in  all  this  work  of  the  past  can  be  ignored. 
Each  phase  has  emphasized  a  vital  element,  implicit 
in  the  teaching  of  the  Founder,  nor  is  any  phase  ever 
outgrown.  But  the  time  has  come  to  add  to  the  achieve- 
ments of  the  past.  Doctrine,  liturgy,  personal  religion 
must  now  be  supplemented  and  sustained  by  a  large 
social  conception  of  a  regenerate  humanity;  and  to 
accomplish  this  splendid  task  we  must  recover  that 
idea  of  the  Kingdom  of  God,  so  curiously  ignored 
through  Christian  history,  which  the  Master  held 
steadily  before  his  disciples  as  the  inspiration  of  their 
way  and  the  goal  of  human  striving.  For  centuries, 
while  the  seed  slowly  ripened  underground,  the  amaz- 
ing thought  of  Jesus  has  waited  for  realization.  With 
the  simultaneous  advent  of  democratic  and  evolution- 
ary conceptions,  its  social  significance  is  disclosed  as 
never  before ;  with  the  maturing  of  these  conceptions 
will  come  its  opportunity.  The  unlovely,  unchristian 
aspects  of  modern  life  mean  only  that  the  disease  and 
evil  which  contradict  the  Divine  Will  have  worked 
their  way,  out  from  the  social  depths,  to  the  surface 
where  they  can  be  seen  and  fought.  To-day  the  Christ- 

399 


THE  FUTURE  OF  RELIGION 

ian  experiment  confronts  a  better  chance  of  victory 
than  at  any  time  since  the  days  when  its  superb  ex- 
altation of  humility  converted  the  Roman  Empire.  It 
may  be  that  in  the  long  run  the  religion  of  Jesus  will 
survive  only  if  it  embraces  this  opportunity,  and  by 
infusing  a  soul  into  the  body  of  socialism,  transforms 
the  rising  social  democracy  from  the  "  coming  slavery  n 
to  the  likeness  of  the  free  City  of  the  Great  King. 

Yet  socialism  will  never  truly  be  that  city,  for  it 
cannot  realize  the  Kingdom  of  God  on  earth.  The 
consummation  of  that  Kingdom  is  in  eternity  and  not 
in  time.  Sight  grows  dim  and  speculation  falters,  peer- 
ing down  the  vista  of  the  ages  to  be.  But  there  are 
people,  and  active  socialist  thinkers  among  them,  who 
gain  already  glimpses  of  another  possibility,  beyond 
the  socialist  state.  They  hint  at  a  time  when  the  func- 
tions of  government  shall  be  no  longer  needed:  when 
the  State  shall  have  died  to  live  and  voted  itself  out 
of  existence  in  favor  of  a  more  instinctive  harmony 
controlling  human  relations.  In  that  far  future,  indi- 
vidualism at  its  intensest  shall  at  last  be  perfectly  one 
with  social  welfare.  We  can  hardly  evoke  the  picture 
without  a  shrug  and  sigh.  But  the  philosophical  anarch- 
ist can.  It  is  conceivable  that  he  reads  to  a  greater 
depth  than  we  the  ultimate  hope  in  the  Mind  of 
Jesus. 


CONCLUSION 
"A  WISE   BEHAVIOR" 


CONCLUSION 


PEOPLE  are  not  unknown  to  assume  that  a  creed  is 
a  wall,  and  a  prison  wall  at  that.  Keally,  though,  creeds 
are  not  walls  but  doors,  through  which  one  may  enter 
a  new  world. 

Dogmatic  convictions,  if  worth  anything,  are  not 
ends  but  beginnings.  They  open  the  way  into  new  re- 
gions of  vital  experience.  We  cannot  end  without 
discussing  the  effect  socialist  faith  should  have  on 
private  conduct ;  for  no  one  of  a  religious  cast  of  mind 
can  be  quite  the  same  man  after  he  has  turned  social- 
ist. His  creed  soaks  into  his  character ;  and  by  most 
people  he  meets  that  creed  will  be  largely  judged 
from  the  sort  of  person  it  has  made  him. 

Indeed,  the  jeers  poor  socialists  have  to  endure  are 
a  witness  to  the  high  conception  of  socialism  enter- 
tained by  its  antagonists.  If  socialists  are  not  sociable, 
if  they  live  without  scattering  their  goods  abroad,  if 
they  draw  interest  on  their  money,  they  are  clamorously 
charged  with  inconsistency.  The  criticisms  are  exas- 
perating and  remote  from  the  point.  Nevertheless  there 
is  some  force  to  them,  if  socialism  be,  as  we  perpetually 
contend,  not  only  future  promise  but  present  growth. 
New  institutions,  however  good,  will  never  last  unless 

403 


CONCLUSION 


they  be  created,  not  by  the  policy  of  rulers,  whether 
individual  autocrats  or  democratic  majorities,  but  by 
the  pressure  of  transformed  characters. 

Now  socialists,  more's  the  pity,  frequently  keep 
their  socialism  in  cold  storage,  like  certain  bulbs  in  the 
winter,  waiting  to  plant  till  the  socialist  spring  shall 
have  arrived.  But  an  act  of  faith  is  always  involved 
in  spring  planting;  and  since  the  spring  is  at  hand, 
and  personality  is  the  only  soil  in  which  convictions 
can  flourish,  we  must  take  our  socialist  principles  out 
of  our  mental  cellar  and  plant  them  deep  in  the  pleas- 
ant warmth  of  heart  and  will.  "  Our  wilderness  is  the 
wide  world  in  an  atheistic  century,"  Diogenes  Teufels- 
drock  remarked ;  if  we  are  going  as  we  hope  to  make 
that  wilderness  blossom  as  the  rose,  it  is  high  time  to 
attend  to  our  seedlings. 

"  Let  your  conversation  be  in  heaven,"  said  the 
apostle  quaintly,  meaning  by  conversation  all  inter- 
course with  our  fellow  men.  Socialism  will  not  be  heaven, 
but  we  do  hope  that  it  will  have  some  features  in  com- 
mon with  the  Holy  City  which  is  forever  "  coming 
down  "  out  of  the  unseen ;  and  only  if  we  obey  the 
apostolic  exhortation  can  we  ever  expect  that  City  to 
stand  firm  on  earth.  But  how  abide  in  celestial  places 
while  our  feet  tread  modern  streets  ? 

In  trying  to  be  a  citizen  of  the  socialist  community 
before  it  gets  here,  one  encounters  heavy  odds.  Here 
is  that  instinctive  hatred  of  restraint  which  has  cap- 
tured our  education  and  our  religion,  and  is  fighting 
hard  to  capture  our  domestic  ethics ;  here  is  the  spirit 

404 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


of  revolt  engendered  by  socialism  itself  in  its  present 
militant  phase;  and  here  that  old  handicap  of  the 
System,  discouraging  at  every  turn  the  virtues  which 
alone  can  sustain  the  cooperative  commonwealth.  Can 
we  have  our  conversation  in  the  heaven  of  good  will, 
while  called  to  play  our  part  in  a  world  which  admits 
good  will  only  as  an  appendix  to  the  serious  business 
of  living?  The  task  seems  impossible,  a  crusade  for 
a  living  perfection  more  hopeless  by  far  than  that  which 
sought  to  rescue  the  tomb  of  the  dead  Saviour.  And 
it  is  true  that  we  must  not  expect  too  much  of  our- 
selves or  of  our  comrades,  —  for  nobody  can  be  an 
entirely  good  socialist  in  an  individualistic  regime. 
"  Nor  soul  helps  flesh  more,  now,  than  flesh  makes 
soul,"  said  wise  old  Ben  Ezra :  the  sacramental  re- 
action is  continuous,  and  we  have  no  corporate  body 
yet  in  which  the  socialist  soul  can  attain  to  its  full 
growth. 

But  we"  can  do  our  best ;  and  that  somewhat  dis- 
credited pursuit,  the  culture  of  the  interior  life,  cer- 
tainly gains  fresh  interest  from  the  new  point  of  view. 
"  I  wish  you  to  open  the  New  Year  with  a  sacrifice  to 
the  Graces ;  to  put  off  the  old  and  put  on  the  new 
man,"  — wrote  that  amazing  old  worldling,  Lord  Ches- 
terfield, to  his  much-enduring  son.  Seeing  the  great 
New  Year  a-tremble  at  the  point  of  dawn,  it  behooves 
us  to  follow  Chesterfield's  good  advice ;  to  endue  our- 
selves, so  far  as  in  us  lies,  with  the  new  Adam  who 
can  thrive  in  the  socialist  state  to  be. 


405 


CONCLUSION 


II 

Not  that  the  new  citizenship  calls  for  new  virtues; 
the  qualities  which  must  create  and  maintain  it  are  as 
old  as  morality  itself.  We  are  never  likely  to  outgrow 
those  Beatitudes,  which  have  been  called  "  the  touch- 
stone of  every  social  and  political  order."  Let  us  de- 
velop in  ourselves  that  loss  of  self  in  the  general  life 
which  is  poverty  of  spirit ;  that  noble  sorrow  over  the 
sufferings  of  the  world  which  will  lead  to  the  world's 
consolation;  that  indifference  to  self  -  advancement 
which  is  evangelical  meekness,  and  which  shall  in  the 
new  day  literally  inherit  the  earth.  Let  us  hunger  and 
thirst  —  as  the  Vulgate  translation  has  it — after  jus- 
tice. Let  us  practice  mercy,  purity  of  heart,  and  that 
positive  passion  of  the  peacemaker  which,  far  from 
being  passive,  is  truly  the  master-passion  that  must 
evolve  from  the  present  world,  the  world  we  long  to  see. 
If  we  do  all  this,  we  shall  indeed  in  all  certainty  in- 
herit the  last  blessing,  and  be  persecuted  for  right- 
ousness'  sake  ;  but  we  shall  also  be  hastening  the  day 
when  these  virtues  will  be  the  natural  soul  and  the 
impelling  motive -power  of  the  social  and  economic 
organism. 

Yet  if  we  have  no  new  virtues  to  offer,  we  do  have 
what  most  men  crave  and  need, — a  new  incentive. 
"  For  their  sakes  I  sanctify  myself,"  said  the  Lord 
Jesus,  —  and  in  the  great  word  reconciled  forever  the 
vexed  claims  of  self-culture  and  social  devotion.  The 
race  must  learn  to  use  that  word  more  fully  as  a 

406 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


lamp  unto  its  feet.  Thank  God,  the  Beatitudes  are 
practiced  already  up  to  a  certain  point.  They  have 
created  personal  types  unknown  to  the  Pagan  world, 
and  through  all  generations  myriads  of  quiet  people 
have  experienced  their  inner  sweetness  and  their  su- 
pernatural power.  The  passion  for  moral  beauty,  the 
longing  for  inward  peace,  have  always  impelled  men 
to  be  humble  and  loving.  They  spring  from  the  in- 
eradicable logic  of  theJieart,  offering  each  man, a  per- 
sonal solution  of  his  life's  mystery.  But  to-day,  rein- 
forced by  the  logic  of  the  mind,  they  flash  upon  us  the 
glory  of  a  larger  vision.  There  is  no  stimulus  like 
hope  ;  and  never  in  the  long  sad  story  of  social  evolu- 
tion has  there  been  a  hope  like  ours.  Have  we  not 
in  this  hope  inspiration  for  a  great  moral  revival  ? 
Must  we  not,  in  the  light  of  it,  be  incalculably 
strengthened  in  our  inner  disciplines,  here  and  now  ? 
To  fight  on  the  fierce  battle-ground  of  one's  own  na- 
ture to  develop  the  new  ethics  is  one  of  those  hidden 
labors,  those  potential  martyrdoms,  by  which  the  world 
is  saved. 

If  one  turns  the  pages  of  those  manuals  of  devo- 
tion popular  in  certain  circles,  he  will  be  struck  by 
the  curious  absence  of  any  attempt  to  scrutinize  the 
social  reactions  of  our  words  and  deeds.  Stimuli  and 
criteria  are  all  mystical:  they  relate  to  experiences 
which  the  ordinary  person  finds  elusive  if  not  unreal. 
The  socialist  is  likely  to  feel  a  contemptuous  revulsion 
from  these  little  books  if  he  ever  opens  them ;  he 
would  do  better  if  he  set  himself  to  rewrite  them. 

407 


CONCLUSION 


For  they  are  a  monument  of  the  supreme  psycholog- 
ical achievement  of  the  Church  Catholic,  —  her  power 
to  regulate  and  purify  the  interior  life. 

The  new  order,  no  less  than  the  old,  will  need  this 
power.  The  fine  art  of  daily  living  is  sometimes  neg- 
lected by  the  most  exalted  natures,  and  as  nervous  or- 
ganizations become  more  complex,  it  grows  constantly 
harder ;  it  also  grows  more  essential.  Socialism  teaches 
us  to  practice  it  with  a  new  zest.  How  salutary,  to 
realize  that  every  indulgence  in  dictatorial  word  or 
act,  every  snub  administered  to  virtuous  tediousness, 
every  yielding  to  temperamental  distaste,  retards  the 
day  of  the  new  social  order ;  while  each  temptation  to 
these  things  is  a  chance  to  win  a  victory  for  democracy 
and  to  educe  the  future  citizen !  And,  far  more  sub- 
tle than  any  control  of  behavior,  comes  the  call  to 
watch  those  springs  of  conduct,  the  motions  of  the 
heart.  A  little  self-examination  every  night,  quite 
after  the  old  devotional  pattern,  would  be  of  service  : 
Should  I  have  been  a  good  citizen  of  the  socialist  state 
to-day?  Have  I  cultivated  in  myself  the  impulses 
that  will  be  abiding  incentives  to  life  and  labor,  when 
incentives  born  of  self-interest  will  be  at  a  discount? 
Have  I  desired  honor,  achievement,  serviceableness, 
rather  than  mere  profit  ?  Have  I  loved  my  work  (pro- 
vided it  be  in  any  wise  lovable),  for  work's  sake,  not 
for  gain's  sake  ?  Have  I  been  as  sorry  over  the  suffer- 
ings of  my  neighbor  as  of  myself,  as  watchful  of  his 
interest  as  of  my  own  ?  Has  my  spirit  been  free  from 
evil  suspicion,  or  pleasure  in  getting  ahead  of  others, 

408 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


and  full  of  brotherly  trust  in  men  ?  Have  I  found  my 
joys  less  in  what  I  call  "  mine  "  than  in  the  bounties 
and  blessings  we  call  "  ours  "  ? 

It  is  all  extremely  simple.  But  if  we  can  say  "  Yes," 
then  in  our  hearts  at  least  the  New  Order  has  been 
born. 

Why  should  not  the  new  point  of  view  be  taught 
systematically  in  socialist  and  Christian  Sunday 
schools?  It  would  furnish  an  inspiriting  program. 
Frank  handling  of  the  ideals  of  Jesus  with  the  young 
has  always  been  a  delicate  matter;  for  even  small 
children,  discovering  that  the  conduct  enjoined  by  the 
Master  works  badly  in  daily  life,  are  likely  to  put  awk- 
ward questions.  They  will  go  on  doing  so  till  the  tran- 
sition is  over,  but  we  have  no  right  to  evade  their  per- 
plexities. We  may  as  well  be  candid  and  confess  to  the 
rising  generation  that  it  is  not  possible  to-day  to  be 
thoroughly  faithful  to  Christian  ethics,  and  we  ought 
to  explain  why  not.  But  we  can  make  it  feel  how 
fascinating  and  romantic  it  is  to  be  faithful  as  far  as 
we  can.  In  that  endless  tussle  to  get  the  better  of  self, 
which  grows  so  tedious  that  we  are  all  tempted  some- 
times to  give  it  up  from  its  sheer  monotony,  our  young 
people  can  be  sustained  by  the  assurance  that  they 
are  not  only  obeying  a  mysterious  Divine  Will,  and 
purifying  their  own  souls,  but  are  also  helping  the 
whole  race  to  a  happier  and  better  state  of  things.  They 
can  be  trained  to  translate  the  old  code  of  the  Beati- 
tudes into  new  social  power  just  so  far  as  they  possibly 
can ;  and  to  undertake  the  great  Christian  adventure, 

409 


CONCLUSION 


not  as  apologetic  and  half-hearted  exiles  in  a  world 
run  on  contrary  lines,  but  as  joyous  heralds  of  a  free 
society,  in  which  the  Kingdom  of  God  shall  have  come 
not  in  word  but  in  power.  And,  as  it  is  useless  to  teach 
what  one  does  not  practice,  our  own  incentives  will  be 
sharpened  in  proportion  as  we  bend  ourselves  to  the 
work  of  education. 

Ill 

The  transformation  of  character  which  socialism 
will  call  for  is  a  stupendous  thing  to  contemplate.  But 
the  glad  marvel  is  that  in  the  secret  depths  of  life  the 
sign  is  given,  the  miracle  begins  to  be  wrought. 

Socialism  when  it  comes  will  arrive  as  no  imposition 
of  an  alien  yoke,  but  as  the  satisfaction  of  a  deep 
desire,  which  has  had  a  causal  potency.  At  point  after 
point  the  leaven  of  democracy  working  among  us  ren- 
ders our  moral  disciplines  practicable  and  our  hope 
assured.  Because  the  Kingdom  is  already  within  us,  we 
dare  to  labor  for  its  visible  advent. 

What  else  means  our  determination  that  the  average 
man  shall  have  his  fair  chance, — a  determination  so  in- 
grained that  in  the  teeth  of  obvious  fact  it  makes  some 
people  insist  that  he  has  it  already?  This  determination 
is  the  germ  of  the  new  moral  order,  and  it  has  been  at 
work  in  the  social  organism  for  more  than  a  hundred 
years.  Planted  by  the  French  Revolution,  it  was  tersely 
expressed  by  Napoleon  in  his  memorable  phrase, — "La 
carriere  ouverte  aux  talents."  Its  promise  has  actually 
been  fulfilled  to  a  limited  degree.  Class-barriers  have 

410 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


become  no  longer  fixed,  but  fluid;  the  exceptional 
though  not  the  average  workman  has  been  able  under 
some  circumstances,  though  not  under  all,  to  rise  into 
prosperous  freedom.  We  have  been  so  excited  over 
this  novel  phenomenon  that  we  have  congratulated 
ourselves  on  it  altogether  too  warmly ;  for  on  the  large 
scale  and  in  the  long  run,  the  promise  has  been  a 
wretched  delusion,  as  it  must  always  be  under  a  com- 
petitive regime.  Meantime  this  promise  has  struck  in- 
ward ;  and  now  that  we  are  learning  that  it  can  never  be 
effectively  fulfilled  till  democracy  is  socialized,  we  can 
and  must  set  to  work  with  zest  at  constructing  and 
adopting  the  new  code  which  will  express  in  all  relations 
of  life,  from  manners  to  morals,  the  new,  the  socialized 
man. 

From  manners  to  morals.  Looking  for  what  we  can 
seize  on  in  the  present  to  guide  us  toward  the  future, 
we  shall  not  do  amiss  to  glance  again  at  that  obvious 
athletic  field,  so  to  speak,  the  exercise* of  courtesy. 
Here  at  least  the  tradition  of  a  non-competitive  atti- 
tude lingers.  We  have  a  code  which  we  only  need  to 
practice.  How  awkward  we  are  at  it,  especially  in  de- 
mocratic and  unconventional  relations,  is  evident  if 
we  watch  the  bearing  of  most  uptown  people  oscillate 
between  constraint  and  patronage  at  for  instance  a 
settlement  party ;  yet  we  do  know  good  manners  when 
we  see  them,  and  so,  it  is  salutary  to  recall,  do  shop- 
girls and  workmen.  Syr  Calidore,  Spenser's  young 
Knight  of  Courtesy,  has  as  honorable  a  place  among 
the  virtues  as  Temperance  or  Justice,  and  in  choosing 

411 


CONCLUSION 


him  for  elect  lover  of  the  shepherdess  Pastorella  and 
comrade  of  her  boorish  mates,  the  most  aristocratic 
of  our  poets  hints  delicately  that  true  courtesy  creates 
its  own  atmosphere  of  equality.  Democracy  on  the  de- 
fensive has  bred  vicious  manners ;  democracy  triumph- 
ant will  revive,  we  trust,  the  graces  of  other  days. 
It  is  for  us  to  bridge  the  transition,  and  we  can  only 
do  this  if  we  cultivate  in  ourselves,  from  this  moment, 
toward  dependents,  employees,  persons  of  dirty  hands 
and  ugly  speech,  sharers  of  the  same  trolley,  casual  ac- 
quaintances, and  members  of  the  family  circle,  the 
"  gentle  heart  that  gentle  manners  breeds." 

Another  task  to  be  undertaken  without  delay  is  the 
transformation  of  the  attitude  of  the  rising  generation 
toward  property,  —  a  feat  only  possible,  we  remember, 
if  we  succeed  in  transforming  our  own.  Here,  too, 
there  are  many  points  of  which  we  can  take  advantage. 
As  we  saw  in  discussing  the  matter,  pure  egotism  is 
rarer  than  we  think,  and  nearly  all  forms  of  property 
passion  have  a  social  element  which  can  be  increased. 
We  must  simply  deepen  the  shadow  which  is  coming  to 
rest  for  sensitive  people  on  most  forms  of  private  own- 
ership, and  train  ourselves  in  regard  to  material  ob- 
jects, to  care  supremely  for  "  joy  in  widest  commonal- 
ity spread.''  To  do  this  the  instincts  of  culture  must 
be  turned  upside  down :  could  we  once  become  apolo- 
getic rather  than  complacent  over  fastidious  and  ex- 
clusive tastes,  we  should  be  a  little  farther  on  the  way. 
Meantime,  to  test  our  satisfactions  by  a  social  criterion 
is  capital  drill :  — 

412 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


I  have  a  golden  ball, 
A  big,  bright,  shining  one, 
Pure  gold,  — and  it  is  all 
Mine.  —  It  is  the  sun. 

I  have  a  silver  ball, 
A  white  and  glistering  stone 
That  other  people  call 
The  moon,  —  my  very  own ! 

And  everything  that 's  mine 
Is  yours,  and  yours,  and  yours,  — 
The  shimmer  and  the  shine  !  — 
Let 's  lock  our  wealth  outdoors  ! l 

Again,  we  have  an  interesting  work  before  us  in  de- 
ciding how  far  we  may  wisely  open  the  ear  of  young 
people  to  that  militant  summons  which  socialism  utters 
just  now.  But  the  difficulty  is  less  than  that  which  a 
nation  faces  in  wartime.  We  can  point  out  that  the 
bravest  fighters  have  been  the  greatest  lovers  of  peace, 
and  that  he  whose  advent  was  heralded  by  the  promise, 
Peace  on  earth,  did  not  hesitate  to  announce  at  the 
due  time  that  he  came  to  bring  not  peace  but  a  sword. 
And  we  can  set  all  students  of  justice,  old  and  young, 
to  the  stimulating  and  feasible,  if  paradoxical,  endeavor 
to  remain  in  perfect  charity  with  all  men,  even  while 
they  bind  themselves  to  resolute  action  and  to  un- 
flinching fellowship  in  that  class-struggle  which  alone 
can  reestablish  the  evangelical  ideal. 

These  are  mere  casual  hints :  as  we  look  more  widely 
abroad,  over  the  hopeful  signs  which  even  now  witness 

1  F.  Converse,  A  Masque  of  Sibyls. 
413 


CONCLUSION 


to  the  possibility  of  the  new  order,  more  than  can  be 
mentioned  flash  on  the  vision.  We  must  pause  an 
instant  over  the  indestructible  power  of  the  family. 
For  in  spite  of  the  sinister  increase  of  divorces,  and 
the  loud  fussing  over  marital  unhappiness,  the  family 
group  persists,  presenting  a  cooperative  commonwealth 
in  miniature.  Its  health  and  vitality  even  in  these  blight- 
ing days  is  the  best  evidence  we  can  have  of  the  force  of 
association.  In  the  midst  of  public  and  industrial  life 
where  quite  opposite  standards  obtain,  it  in  the  main 
continues  successfully  to  holdlip  an  ideal  involving  the 
loving  self-subordination  of  every  member  to  every 
other.  If  the  homes  of  the  nation  are  indeed  its  true 
altars,  they  afford  a  proof  that  centrifugal  forces  are 
stronger  than  centripetal,  that  the  power,  which  drives 
men  away  from  their  egotism  and  combines  them  in 
self-effacing  harmonies  is  stronger  than  that  which 
marshals  them  as  hostile  independent  atoms. 

And  already,  how  many  groups  are  forming  which 
like  the  family  offer  no  barriers  to  affection  and  good 
will !  The  immense  modern  development  of  organiza- 
ation,  with  all  its  unlovely  features  and  trying  disci- 
plines, is  no  mechanical  fact,  but  a  profoundly  signi- 
ficant spiritual  necessity.  There  are  still  many  people 
who  rebel,  but  they  are  a  minority,  and  even  our  most 
inveterate  hermits  are  likely  to  find  themselves  in  their 
own  despite  "  restored  to  social  neighborhood."  Out- 
side the  charmed  circle  of  industrial  relations,  most 
people  gravitate  more  and  more  into  friendly  groups. 
They  storm  Parnassus  fifty  abreast ;  they  study  the  in- 

414 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


timacies  of  religion  and  literature  in  the  women's  club 
rather  than  in  the  closet ;  they  visit  Europe  by  prefer- 
ence in  "personally  conducted  "  droves. 

It  is  easy  to  laugh  at  the  tendency ;  but,  after  all, 
the  meaning  of  the  instinct  is  good,  and  the  more 
deeply  socialized  we  are  the  more  we  shall  yield  our- 
selves to  it.  For  as  we  experience  the  disciplined  de- 
lights of  the  fine  art  of  fellowship,  social  feeling  and 
action  will  gain  a  potency  which  more  individualistic 
days  were  unable  to  divine,  and  the  varying  types  of  in- 
tercourse will  increasingly  exhale  fragrances  as  varied 
and  delectable  as  those  of  a  summer  garden. 

The  voluntary  centres  of  the  common  life,  forming 
within  that  infinitely  rich  and  varied  consciousness,  the 
nation,  are  the  hope  and  promise  of  democracy.  For 
the  rhythms  of  existence  are  coming  more  and  more  to 
connote  harmony  rather  than  melody,  and  everywhere 
men  rally  to  the  call  of  a  new  music,  rich  in  orchestral 
glory,  the  beat  of  which  to  a  sensitive  ear  is  the  under- 
tone of  all  our  active  life. 

So,  at  point  after  point,  in  province  after  province, 
we  can  find  our  opportunity  to  foster  the  new  life. 
It  is  Inferno  where  "without  hope,  men  live  on  in 
desire "  ;  but  desire  is  creative,  where  it  is  touched 
with  hope,  —  and  hope  is  our  special  twentieth-century 
blessing.  Talk  with  friends,  look  into  our  own  hearts : 
do  we  not  find  the  social  compunction  everywhere  astir, 
shot  through  with  strange  flashes  and  pulses  of  expec- 
tation ?  Do  we  not  know  it  to  be  true,  however  we  fail 
or  stumble,  that  if  the  prospect  of  release  from  the 

415 


CONCLUSION 


burden  of  communal  sin  and  shame  could  be  effectively 
offered,  a  large  proportion  of  plain  men  and  women 
would  leap  to  welcome  it  more  eagerly  than  to  any 
prospect  of  personal  gain  ?  The  ideal  on  which  Christ- 
ianity has  insisted  during  two  thousand  weary  years  " 
is  at  last  penetrating  every  nerve  centre  of  the  com- 
mon life.  The  maturing  powers  of  democracy  are 
achieving  the  amazing  fact ;  and  he  who  fails  in  his 
own  inner  battles  is  false  to  Christianity  and  to  de- 
mocracy alike. 

IV 

There  is  one  problem  in  personal  morals  that  bids 
us  linger:  it  concerns  the  right  attitude  of  the  so- 
cialist toward  personal  expenditure.  As  we  have  hinted, 
the  public  is  sensitive  on  this  point.  Perhaps  nothing 
more  discredits  the  socialist  movement  than  the  lack 
of  any  special  self-denial  in  the  use  of  money,  among 
socialists  at  large.  For  although  none  of  us  obey  Tol- 
stoy, we  all  read  him.  Thoreau  and  Carpenter  has  each 
his  following,  and  even  our  old  worthy,  John  Woolman, 
is  reprinted  in  fresh  editions.  We  ourselves  may  have 
no  idea  of  adopting  the  views,  far  less  the  practice,  of 
any  of  these  gentlemen :  but  we  feel  that  people  who 
pretend  to  want  to  turn  the  world  upside  down,  in  the 
name  of  social  justice,  ought  to  do  so.  This  book  has 
cast  slurs  on  poor  Simplicity,  that  bourgeois  sister  of 
St.  Francis's  aristocratic  dame,  Madonna  Poverta. 
But  we  live  in  bourgeois  days  and  many  feel  that  the 
little  sister  has  a  useful  part  to  play :  "  May  it  not  be 

416 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


the  psychical  hour,"  asks  Professor  Laughlin,  of  Chi- 
cago, "  to  call  for  the  creation  of  a  new  aristocracy  of 
the  Simple  Life,  of  those  who  care  for  the  true  inward 
pleasure  of  the  mind  rather  than  evanescent  show  ?  " 
Bishop  Westcott,  of  blessed  memory,  tried  to  form  a 
sort  of  ascetic  militia  from  among  the  courtiers  of 
Queen  Victoria ;  H.  G.  Wells  presents  a  similar  al- 
luring type  in  the  Samurai  of  his  modern  Utopia ; 
and  the  talk  about  Simplicity  even  degenerates  into 
cant  and  is  fair  game  for  ridicule. 

One  does  not  observe  that  socialists  are  more  in- 
clined than  other  folk  to  join  the  "  new  aristocracy," 
or  become  Samurai :  and  disappointed  people  say  in 
consequence  that  they  would  be  more  ready  to  embrace 
the  creed  if  its  adherents  practiced  what  they  preach. 
It  is  a  superficial  statement.  There  is  no  logical  rea- 
son why  a  socialist  should  share  his  possessions  or  deny 
himself,  any  more  than  any  one  else.  A  man  may  hate 
and  deprecate  the  system  which  makes  swollen  fortunes 
possible,  and  may  fight  it  hard,  while  recognizing  at 
the  same  time  that  under  present  circumstances  it 
would  not  do  the  cause  or  any  one  the  least  good  for 
him  to  distribute  his  money  to  the  poor.  Since  now- 
adays wealth  has  to  change  from  one  private  hand  to 
another,  socialists  think  that,  other  things  being  equal, 
it  is  better  in  the  hands  of  a  good  socialist  than  it 
would  be  elsewhere.  They  entirely  agree  with  the 
sages  who  inform  us  that  if  a  private  property  were 
equally  divided,  even  the  largest  would  spread  too  thin 
to  be  of  any  use,  and  that  if  we  make  things  equal 

417 


CONCLUSION 


to-day  they  would  be  unequal  to-morrow.  William 
Morris  was  a  socialist  who  died  rich.  He  was  an  hon- 
est and  disinterested  man,  and  it  is  probable  that  dis- 
tasteful labors  in  the  cause  of  socialism  hastened  his 
death,  but  he  was  endowed  with  good  Anglo-Saxon 
shrewdness.  The  keen  discussion  of  his  point  of  view 
in  Mackail's  excellent  biography  is  instructive  reading. 
The  economic  doctrine  of  socialism  has  nothing  to 
do  with  the  use  of  private  property  here  and  now ; 
and  from  the  intellectual  side  there  is  nothing  in  so- 
cialist principles  to  oblige  a  socialist  to  give  up  the 
luxuries  and  pleasures  of  life.  The  constant  sneers  at 
rich  socialists  are  only  one  symptom  of  the  mental  confu- 
sion in  which  we  are  entangled.  If  sneers  are  in  order, 
they  should  be  directed,  not  against  the  rich  socialist, 
—  whose  theories  have  no  connection  with  his  place 
in  the  economic  scale,  —  but  against  the  rich  Christian, 
claiming  to  follow  a  Master  who  explicitly  tells  him 
that  his  position  is  perilous  and  in  gentle  words  that 
permit  no  evasion  advises  him  to  renounce  it.  No  one, 
however,  hears  the  wealthy  church  warden  charged 
with  inconsistency  in  respectable  circles.  Ever  since 
the  mediaeval  attitude  toward  poverty  as  a  virtue  has 
yielded  to  the  modern  attitude  which  regards  it  as  a 
vice  or  a  disgrace,  Christian  profession  and  large 
worldly  possessions  have  hobnobbed  cheerfully.  Yet, 
all  the  tune,  the  appeal  for  self-restraint  and  simplic- 
ity comes  straight  from  the  heart  of  Christianity  ;  and 
the  most  individualistic  Christian,  who  acknowledges 
the  authority  or  even  the  wisdom  of  Jesus,  is  under 

418 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


far  heavier  bonds  in  this  respect  than  the  most  dras- 
tic socialist.  The  great  modern  preachers  of  the  simple 
life,  for  that  matter,  culminating  in  Tolstoy,  have  not 
been  socialists  at  all. 

At  the  same  time  the  socialist  who  does  practice 
self-restraint  commends  his  message  infinitely  more 
than  he  who  lives  conventionally.  Delicate  living  on 
the  part  of  advocates  of  the  new  creed  is  a  rock  of  of- 
fense in  the  way  of  hundreds.  When  a  young  clergy- 
man, laboring  in  a  tenement-house  district  through 
the  summer  heats,  and  mystically  ardent  to  spare  him- 
self at  no  point  where  his  people  suffer,  encounters  a 
group  of  political  socialists  on  a  holiday,  drinking 
choice  vintages  and  demanding  loudly  the  best  accom- 
modations in  hotels,  it  is  only  human  nature  that  he 
should  turn  away  sad  and  disappointed  from  the  mes- 
sage to  which  he  had  been  drawn. 

Nor  is  his  disappointment  sentimental.  On  the  in- 
tellectual side,  to  be  sure,  the  self-indulgent  socialist 
is  beyond  the  reach  of  argument.  But  how  about  the 
moral  side,  and  that  preparation  of  will  and  conscience 
for  the  new  order  which  we  must  never  forget  to  stress  ? 
Not  only  our  minds  but  our  habits  must  be  put  in 
training  for  the  socialist  state ;  and  to  limit  our  re- 
sources severely  to  what  would  be  available  for  every 
one  if  justice  ruled  is  one  of  the  most  necessary  parts 
of  the  training.  Once  accept  this  postulate  and  we 
shall  be  constrained  to  feel  that  no  socialist  Christian 
to-day  has  any  business  to  gain  or  to  use  for  personal 
ends  more  than  is  necessary  to  keep  him  mentally  and 

419 


CONCLUSION 


physically  efficient.  How  much  this  may  be  can  be 
determined  only  by  intimate  self-examination.  In  no 
field  is  the  permission,  Judge  not,  more  salutary  and 
comforting.  There  is  no  doubt  that  luxury  beyond  a 
certain  point  suffocates  personality,  just  as  poverty 
beyond  a  certain  point  atrophies  it ;  but  in  search  for 
the  point  we  encounter  a  sliding  scale.  The  amount 
necessary  to  educe  full  joy  and  power  differs  with  tem- 
perament, capacity  and  the  stage  of  development.  One 
man  may  conceivably  need  three  motors  for  his  soul's 
health,  while  his  neighbor  thrives  on  trolley  trips  :  one 
woman  perhaps  cannot  live  harmoniously  without  Per- 
sian rugs,  while  another  keeps  her  heart  cleanest  with 
bare  floors.  Let  us  be  tolerant  toward  others,  severe 
toward  ourselves. 

In  this  matter  close  discrimination  is  in  order.  We 
have  to  distinguish  between  present  duty,  incumbent 
on  us  while  we  are  as  now  in  a  sort  of  social  siege,  and  ul- 
timate ideals.  Three  factors  have  impelled  men  to  self- 
restraint  in  the  use  of  material  goods.  There  is  the 
ascetic  instinct  of  the  East  and  the  Middle  Ages,  which 
holds  the  flesh  as  intrinsically  dangerous.  There  is  the 
good  taste  of  the  Greeks,  convinced  that  only  a  severe 
ascesis  can  enable  us  to  know  the  Beautif  ul-and-Good. 
And,  finally,  there  is  that  social  compunction  which 
cannot  rejoice  in  abundance  or  pleasure  while  one  of 
"the  least  of  these  "  feels  want. 

The  ascetic  impulse  is  at  a  discount  to-day;  many 
people  believe  that  the  world  has  permanently  out- 
grown it,  though  we  have  seen  some  reason  to  doubt 

420 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


this  opinion.  Meanwhile,  and  until  the  time  of  our 
transition  is  accomplished,  social  compunction  must 
indubitably  be  the  strongest  modern  motive  impelling 
men  to  simplicity  of  life.  Between  the  lapse  of  asceti- 
cism and  the  rise  of  this  compunction,  intervened  the 
most  vulgarly  self-indulgent  period  the  Christian  world 
has  ever  known.  Here  and  there,  even  during  this 
period,  a  man  possessed  of  the  good  taste  that  comes  from 
living  in  the  Spirit,  arose  to  protest.  Thus  Wordsworth, 
at  the  outset  of  the  nineteenth  century,  sang  his  deli- 
cately classical  ideal  of  a  simple  life  chosen  from  sheer 
preference  of  economy  in  joy.  We  need  -only  compare 
the  poetry  of  Wordsworth  with  the  prose  of  that  great 
modern  teacher  of  simplicity,  John  Ruskin,  to  see  how 
swiftly  and  markedly  a  new  emphasis  appeared.  For 
in  Ruskin,  lover  of  all  rich  beauty  in  life  and  art,  the 
passion  of  pity  became  a  constraining  force,  and  the 
most  cogent  portions  of  his  social  teaching  are  those 
which  enjoin  us  not  to  abound  while  others  suffer,  and 
to  refrain  from  even  the  most  legitimate  forms  of  lux- 
ury which  it  may  have  injured  our  brothers  to  produce.1 

Sir  [says  the  tutor  to  the  rich  boy  in  Raskin's  splendid 
words],  you  are  so  placed  in  society,  —  it  may  be  for  your 
misfortune,  it  must  be  for  your  trial,  —  that  you  are  likely 
to  be  maintained  all  your  life  by  the  labor  of  other  men. 
You  will  have  to  make  shoes  for  nobody,  but  some  one  will 
have  to  make  a  great  many  for  you.  You  will  have  to  dig 
ground  for  nobody,  but  some  one  will  have  to  dig  through 
every  summer's  hot  day  for  you.  You  will  build  houses  and 

1  Time  and  Tide,  Letter  xxi. 
421 


CONCLUSION 


make  clothes  for  no  one,  but  many  a  rough  hand  must  knead 
clay  and  many  an  elbow  be  crooked  to  the  stitch,  to  keep  that 
body  of  yours  warm  and  fine.  Now,  remember,  whatever 
you  and  your  work  may  be  worth,  the  less  your  keep  costs 
the  better.  It  does  not  cost  money  only.  It  costs  degrada- 
tion. You  do  not  merely  employ  these  people.  You  also 
tread  upon  them.  It  cannot  be  helped :  —  you  have  your 
place  and  they  have  theirs  ;  but  see  that  you  tread  as  lightly 
as  possible,  and  on  as  few  as  possible.  What  food  and  clothes 
and  lodging  you  honestly  need,  for  your  health  and  peace, 
you  may  righteously  take.  See  that  you  take  the  plainest 
that  you  can  serve  yourself  with,  —  that  you  waste  or  wear 
nothing  vainly,  —  and  that  you  employ  no  man  in  furnish- 
ing you  with  any  useless  luxury.  That  is  the  first  law  of 
Christian  —  or  human  —  economy. 

But  it  is  the  same  Ruskin  who  tells  us :  "  Luxury 
indeed  shall  be  possible  and  innocent  in  the  future,  — 
luxury  for  all  and  by  the  help  of  all."  We,  who  accept 
democracy  and  welcome  the  help  of  machinery,  have 
firmer  ground  than  he  for  this  belief.  We  repudiate 
the  sad,  mid-Victorian  statement :  "  It  cannot  be  helped: 
—  you  have  your  place  and  they  have  theirs."  We  be- 
lieve that  it  can  be  helped,  and  that  the  time  is  com- 
ing when  no  labor  that  costs  degradation  need  be  de- 
manded of  any  son  of  man.  And  so  we  look  forward  to 
a  period  when  questions  concerning  the  ethics  of  con- 
sumption can  be  disentangled  from  social  remorse  and 
put  on  an  independent  basis.  Simplicity  of  life,  if  then 
practiced,  will  stand  on  its  own  merits,  free  from  ad- 
ventitious aids,  whether  ascetic  or  altruistic. 

When  this  time  comes,  it  may  well  be  that  the  Greek 
422 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


ideal  will  be  that  to  which  we  shall  revert.  In  the  just 
commonwealth  of  our  desires,  the  sweets  of  life  will 
be  no  longer  tainted  for  fastidious  palates  by  their 
rarity.  Simplicity  will  no  longer  be  called  for  as  a 
private  and  self-conscious  virtue :  for  it  will  be  as  it 
were  socialized  into  an  instinctive  and  steadying  prin- 
ciple of  the  whole  organization.  We  shall  understand 
why  Plato  appointed  for  guardians  of  his  state,  men 
who  accepted  his  motto :  "  The  less  men  have,  the  more 
they  are  like  the  gods  who  want  nothing."  Our  greedi- 
ness for  luxury  to-day  is  a  natural  obverse  of  our  teas- 
ing fear  of  want :  under  socialism,  a  distinct  preference 
for  simplicity  in  itself  may  be  hoped  for.  The  system 
will  depend  for  its  success  less  on  the  diffusion  of  ma- 
terial goods  than  on  the  diffusion  of  happiness,  and  we 
shall  all  have  mastered  for  our  ideal  of  happiness  the 
lesson  of  Sill's  familiar  lines :  — 

To  be  only,  like  the  rest, 

With  heaven's  common  comforts  blest, 

To  accept  in  humble  part 

Joy  that  shines  on  every  heart 

Never  to  be  set  on  high 

Where  the  envious  curses  fly,  — 

To  be  lost,  except  to  God, 

As  one  grass-blade  in  the  sod, 

Underfoot  with  millions  trod. 

The  Japanese  as  well  as  the  old  Greeks  can  help  us 
to  our  ideal,  if  they  do  not  become  hopelessly  com- 
mercialized and  westernized  before  the  West  reforms. 
Noticing  how  all  the  frugal  necessities  of  life  turn  into 
graces  among  them,  we  perceive  that  true  grace  in- 

423 


CONCLUSION 


heres  rather  in  the  indispensable  than  in  the  super- 
fluous, and  we  shall  bend  ourselves  to  expressing  this 
fact  more  and  more,  in  precise  proportion  as  we  grow 
more  civilized. 

And  even  now,  while  social  compunction  constrains 
the  sensitive  to  abstentions  and  restraints  which  might 
well  be  as  severe  as  those  practiced  by  the  Middle 
Ages,  reflection  on  the  more  sane  and  permanent  ideal 
has  its  value.  Experiments  as  to  what  possessions  men 
really  need  are  as  entertaining  as  the  popular  experi- 
ments in  diet,  and  certainly  have  more  social  impor- 
tance. They  might  well  be  carried  beyond  the  present 
casual  and  personal  stage,  to  the  corporate  and  scien- 
tific. There  is  no  reason  why  "  business  efficiency " 
should  not  be  as  carefully  studied  in  consumption  as 
in  production. 

There  is  an  excellent  selfish  reason  for  beginning 
investigations,  and  submitting  ourselves  to  disciplines, 
immediately.  No  one  can  tell  when  it  may  be  very 
inconvenient  to  us  to  be  as  "  soft "  as  most  of  us  are 
now.  Swift  changes  are  before  us  ;  and  when  the  pro- 
cess of  socialization  shall  become  accelerated  to  the 
degree  that  even  middle-aged  people  may  quite  possi- 
bly witness,  a  temporary  lowering  of  general  prosper- 
ity, and  in  consequence  of  our  entire  standard  con- 
cerning possessions,  may  possibly  be  forced  upon  us. 
In  the  early  stages  of  the  profound  readjustments 
sure  to  follow  the  removal  of  the  competitive  spur,  the 
stream  of  collective  wealth  may  shrink  between  its 
banks  to  a  mere  trickle.  At  the  same  time  the  concen- 

424 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


tration  of  riches  will  be  broken  up,  and  the  process  of 
equalization  resolutely  encouraged.  If  one  thinks  out 
the  resultant  situation,  it  appears  quite  likely  that  the 
immediate  descendants  of  our  present  privileged  classes 
may  find  themselves,  to  their  disconcerted  surprise,  in 
a  hard  world  where  life  will  rather  resemble  the  con- 
ditions of  our  forefathers  in  early  New  England  days 
than  the  easy-going  opulence  familiar  to  Americans 
during  the  last  fifty  years  or  so.  Then  will  be  the  time 
of  test.  May  we  be  strong  to  meet  it ! 


The  religion  of  the  modern  man,  socialist  or  not,  is 
entirely  a  personal  matter.  It  is  to  be  hoped  that  the 
socialist  of  the  future  will  be  sufficiently  "  pragmatic  " 
to  adopt  by  instinct  that  order  of  spiritual  thought 
and  discipline  most  likely  to  meet  the  needs  of  effec- 
tive social  democracy.  Meantime  the  socialist  of  the 
present  may  be  Protestant  or  Catholic,  Bahaist  or 
Christian  Scientist ;  he  may  hold  to  a  materialistic  in- 
terpretation of  history  and  nature,  or  he  may  soar 
among  mystical  nebulae;  but  by  whatever  avenue, 
Christian  or  other,  he  approaches  his  sanctuary,  there 
must  be  two  notes  persistent  in  the  worship  he  proffers 
there  if  his  conception  of  eternity  be  affected  by  the 
forming  social  life  of  our  day.  These  two  notes  are 
expiation  and  aspiration. 

Conviction  of  sin  is  an  increasingly  rare  experience. 
Perhaps  for  the  majority  it  is  merely  a  dark  mirage, 
which  vanishes  as  they  approach  it.  This  change  is 

425 


CONCLUSION 


due  partly  to  our  modern  faith  in  the  Ascent  of  Man, 
partly  to  the  fading-out  of  that  Calvinism  which  de- 
rived remorse  from  our  failure  rather  toward  the  un- 
seen God  than  toward  the  known  and  visible  brother. 
As  immanential  ideas  become  more  general,  and  pan- 
theism in  gross  or  subtle  forms  permeates  our  con- 
sciousness, it  is  natural  that  the  sense  of  guilt  toward 
an  anthropomorphic  Deity,  dimly  discerned  and  infi- 
nitely distant,  should  acquire  unreality,  should  faint 
and  fade. 

Meantime,  however,  the  social  conscience  is  restor- 
ing the  sense  of  sin  to  us,  —  with  how  awful  a  gravity 
we  know,  at  times  like  the  Triangle  fire  when  over  a 
hundred  young  girls  lost  their  lives  through  the  stingy 
refusal  of  the  employing  firm  to  take  decent  precau- 
tions for  safety.  This  sense  of  communal  guilt  must 
strike  more  inward ;  as  it  does  so  it  will  generate  pen- 
itence, which  is  the  only  seed  of  such  purity  as  mortal 
men  are  allowed  to  know  ;  it  will  demand  atonement. 

We  are  all  called  to  repentance ;  but  the  call  rings 
with  special  clearness  to  those  who  feel  themselves  mem- 
bers of  a  corporate  Christianity.  Not  that  we  may 
blame  the  Church  too  much,  or  join  in  cheap  invective 
against  her  because  it  was  not  given  her  to  play  a 
pioneer  part  in  evolving  that  new  social  theory  which 
proves  so  much  to  the  advantage  of  her  aims.  Christ- 
ian distress  and  socialist  contempt  on  this  score  rest 
partly  on  a  misconception.  Intellectual  light  has  never 
yet  come  from  the  quarter  of  the  Church.  Her  function 
is  not  to  furnish  such  light,  nor  even  to  accept  it  in  a 

426 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


hurry ;  but  rather,  when  once  it  has  taken  possession 
of  the  human  mind,  to  utilize  it  for  the  ends  of  the 
Spirit.  But  if  we  may  not  blame  the  Church  in  history 
for  hesitating  over  socialist  theory,  we  can  find  nowhere 
in  the  range  of  her  psychology  an  explanation,  other 
than  sin,  for  her  undemocratic  sympathies,  her  truck- 
ling to  conventionality,  and  that  deep  prejudice  in  favor 
of  things  as  they  are  which  ever  since  the  fatal  Gift 
of  Constantino  has  been  bemoaned  by  all  her  noblest 
children.  The  time  for  moaning  is  over  and  the  time 
for  action  has  come.  The  beginning  of  action  is  the 
call  to  repentance.  In  her  prayers  as  in  her  deeds,  let 
her  accomplish  her  expiation,  longing  for  her  Master 
to  come  with  the  whip  of  small  cords  which  shall  purify 
her  precincts  at  last. 

And  with  penitence,  the  socialist  must  cultivate  as- 
piration :  — 

Nostrum  est  interim  mentes  erigere, 
Et  totis  patriam  votis  appetere, 
Et  ad  Jerusalem  a  Babylonia 
Post  longa  regredi  tandem  exilia. 

We  are  Babylonian  exiles,  indeed  ;  but  we  may  hasten 
the  Kingdom  by  living  "  with  hearts  raised  on  high  " 
as  citizens  of  the  True  Country,  maintaining  loyalty 
even  at  risk  of  persecution  and  failure,  and  conspiring 
indefatigably  to  further  its  interests.  Some  day  the 
very  basis  of  life  will  be  religious  and  the  earning  of 
our  daily  bread  a  sacrament  of  fellowship.  Then  and 
now,  let  us  not  lose  sight  of  the  higher  reaches.  Above 
brotherhood  and  beyond  morality  they  tower,  —  incon- 

427 


CONCLUSION 


ceivably  distant,  awful  in  radiance,  so  all  but  invisible 
in  our  murky  air  that  people  deny  their  existence. 
Concerning  these  heights  it  is  not  lawful  for  us  to  say 
much,  —  nor  perhaps  would  most  of  us  who  live  in 
the  plains  be  able  very  clearly  to  describe  them.  Yet 
they  wait  forever,  and  they  will  be  more  and  more 
visible  as  we  hold  on  our  pilgrim  way  toward  that  City 
encircled  by  the  four  walls  of  equity  and  illumined  by 
the  light  of  sacrifice.  The  pilgrim  knows  as  well  as 
any  one  that  this  city  will  never  be  trodden  by  earthly 
feet.  But  he  knows  also  that  history  is  the  record  of 
progress  toward  it ;  and  he  believes  that  the  socialist 
state  will  approach  more  nearly  than  any  civilization 
yet  witnessed  the  type  of  Jerusalem.  Through  that 
city  of  the  future  shall  flow  the  River  of  Life,  whose 
waters  are  for  the  healing  of  the  nations  that  pour 
their  glory  and  honour  into  it :  and  the  realized  Pres- 
ence of  the  Holiest  shall  make  a  sanctuary  thereof, 
wherein  abides  the  Presence  of  God  and  of  the  Lamb. 
While  men  during  long  centuries  have  sung  their  wist- 
ful songs  about  the  Heavenly  City,  that  Vision  of 
Peace  has  continued  its  perpetual  Becoming.  Bernard 
of  Cluny  sang  the  vision  for  his  generation ;  but  William 
Blake  has  sung  it  for  ours.  Here,  if  anywhere,  here  in 
contemporary  life,  here  among  "our  dark  Satanic 
mills,"  the  City  of  the  Great  King  must  be  builded:  — 

I  will  not  cease  from  mental  fight, 
Nor  shall  my  sword  sleep  in  my  hand, 
Till  we  have  built  Jerusalem 
In  England's  green  and  pleasant  land. 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


VI 

The  intellectual  theories  of  socialism  are  passing  out 
under  our  eyes  into  that  arena  of  practical  politics  be- 
set with  pitfalls  for  the  idealist.  On  the  one  hand,  he 
is  confronted  by  the  danger  of  fastidious  inaction,  on 
the  other,  by  that  of  coarsening  compromise.  A  diffi- 
cult period,  which  English-speaking  countries,  more 
particularly  the  United  States,  are  late  in  entering, 
awaits  us  all.  The  question  concerning  membership  in 
the  socialist  party  must  be  confronted  and  settled  by 
every  person  convinced  of  socialist  principles,  no  mat- 
ter how  alien  to  his  training  and  temperament  some 
features  in  that  party  may  be.  To  suggest  the  right 
decision  is  no  duty  of  this  book.  On  the  one  hand,  the 
movement  is  indubitably  wider  than  any  political  ex- 
pression of  it.  On  the  other  hand,  some  of  us  would 
rather  be  soldiers  under  drill,  in  a  righteous  warfare, 
than  camp-followers  or  sympathizers  at  large. 

Whatever  decision  be  made,  it  will  be  a  pity  if  our 
pilgrim  whose  conversation  is  in  the  socialist  heaven 
fails,  provided  he  have  time  and  energy  to  spare,  to  join 
the  good  fellowship  of  those  engaged  in  practical  social 
service.  The  socialist  organization  will  perhaps  do  well 
to  refuse  compromise  however  tempting,  but  the  so- 
cialist individual  needs  the  opportunity  social  service 
affords  to  practice  cooperation  and  to  manipulate  the 
stuff  of  life  itself.  In  the  synthesis  of  his  creed  he 
may  find  the  comfort  of  a  sure  principle  of  selection  ; 
among  the  lines  of  work  open  for  indorsement  or 

429 


CONCLUSION 


activity,  he  will  choose  such  as  afford  real  training  in 
democratic  fellowship  and  true  steps  toward  social 
equality;  these  he  will  seek  to  relate  more  and  more 
with  those  efforts  of  the  workers  to  achieve  their  own 
salvation  in  which  the  strongest  and  surest  force  for 
progress  is  to  be  found. 

Be  it  noted,  however,  that  only  because  he  is  a  so- 
cialist is  the  power  of  social  service  restored  to  him. 
The  effort  to  save  his  own  soul  or  perfect  his  own 
character  is  more  than  ever  an  apple  of  Sodom  from  a 
mummy  tomb.  The  impulse  to  relieve  'suffering  is  a 
better  thing,  and  unless  he  obeys  it  he  is  likely  to  be 
restless.  Yet  this,  too,  would  be  intolerable  unless  -sus- 
tained by  the  light  of  his  larger  vision.  If^this  vision 
fails  him  for  a  moment,  he  will  instantly  seem  to 
himself  again  to  be  rowing  upstream  as  it  were  in 
a  nightmare,  pulling  with  breathless  exhaustion,  but 
aware  whenever  he  lifts  his  eyes  that  the  banks  are 
slipping  in  a  wrong  direction,  and  that  the  current  is 
carrying  him  and  all  the  human  race,  down,  down, 
to  an  ever  greater  misery  and  a  more  cruelly  surging 
injustice.  Sometimes,  as  he  continues  his  dogged 
efforts  to  ameliorate,  to  console,  to  reform  in  detail,  the 
old  horror  is  upon  him,  the  rage  of  helplessness  possesses 
him.  At  such  moments  let  him  withdraw  for  a  brief 
space  from  the  conflict,  and  make  his  Act  of  Faith,  de- 
voutly as  worshipers  kneeling  at  the  Incarnatus.  Again 
ne  will  breathe  free  and  lift  his  eyes  toward  the  beckon- 
ing hills  of  hope. 

And  with  relentless  constancy,  in  season  and  out  of 
430 


A  WISE  BEHAVIOR 


season,  the  religiously  minded  socialist  will  seek  to 
share  his  faith.  "  Education  toward  socialism,'*  that 
formula  beloved  by  William  Morris,  will  be  his  motto, 
whether  he  be  engaged  in  political  action,  in  journal- 
ism, in  business  life,  in  conversation,  or  in  saying  his 
prayers.  To  exultant  and  open  adherence  to  the  so- 
cialist creed,  he  will  add  a  watchful  self-discipline, 
intent  on  preparing  himself,  and  all  who  may  come 
within  the  sphere  of  his  authority  or  influence,  for  con- 
tented and  efficient  citizenship  in  the  cooperative  com- 
monwealth. Socialism  is  not  a  theory  on  paper ;  it  is 
a  forming  life,  still  embryonic,  to  be  brought  to  the 
birth  at  the  appointed  hour.  And  solemnly,  as  the 
wise  mother  prepares  soul  as  well  as  body  for  her  high 
destiny,  should  our  age  perform  its  similar  duty  to 
that  heir  of  the  worlds  to  come  which  already  is  car- 
ried hi  its  bosom. 


THE    END 


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